What are solutions used to solved water problem in the pacific island context?
Answers
rate. Although less populated countries such as the Cook Islands, the Federal States of Micronesia, Niue, Tonga and Tuvalu have high coverage, the low coverage of Papua New Guinea, which alone represents three-quarters of the region’s population, pushes the regional average to levels comparable with those of the least developed regions. To make matters worse, rapid population growth, increasing urbanization, damage to water catchments resulting from deforestation, poor waste management practices leading to water pollution, and climate change are expected to exacerbate the challenge of providing access to safe water.
The proportion of households with access to improved sanitation varies greatly among the small Pacific island countries. Coverage is below 50% in nearly 40% of the islands. Sanitation systems in the Pacific islands rely principally on pit toilets and septic tanks. Contamination of water supplies caused by inadequate sanitation, along with other sources of pollution, low water availability and the use of poor quality groundwater as drinking water, leads to outbreaks of diarrhoea, cholera and other infectious diseases, such as hepatitis and typhoid. Installation of affordable sanitation systems and the introduction of social programmes focused on behavioural change are needed in small island communities to improve water quality and human health.