Water: Developing Countries

Lord Collins of Highbury Excerpts

Wednesday 24th January 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

My Lords, I too thank the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, for initiating this debate. Availability of clean water underpins human health, economies, livelihoods and cultures. We have heard about SDG 6, on managing water resources, but water management is vital for achieving other goals, especially those on hunger, energy, cities and peace. As we have heard, one in 10 people still live without access to clean water. As the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, said, more than half of schools and 42% of healthcare facilities in sub-Saharan Africa do not have access to clean water.

The availability and sustainable management of water in developing countries is essential to ending extreme poverty and building a healthier and more prosperous world. The high-level panel on water, convened by the UN Secretary-General and the president of the World Bank, has met four times. Its next report will focus on the UN General Assembly resolution on the international decade for action—from 2018 to 2028—on water for sustainable development. They see that resolution as a major vehicle for achieving SDG 6. I would be grateful if the Minister can tell us what steps the Government are taking to use their significant influence to raise the global ambition on the availability of water in multilateral institutions—especially the high-level panel. How are we going to get involved?

As we have heard, according to the UN, in 2015 ODA disbursements in the water sector totalled $8.6 billion, which represents an increase of 67% in real terms since 2005. However, since then it has remained relatively constant as a proportion of total ODA disbursements, at approximately 5%. It is clear that current rates of progress and levels of financing, including by the UK, will be insufficient to achieve universal access to water and sanitation by 2030, which is the target. As we have heard, the UK Government have done extremely positive work, reaching 60 million people with clean water and sanitation between 2010 and 2015. However, currently only 1.6% of the UK’s bilateral aid budget is spent on water and sanitation, compared with 10% by Japan and Korea. Are there plans to invest more than 2% of the UK’s bilateral aid budget on water? Are we determined to ensure that we do not fall behind others in this area? Given the relationship between access to water and sanitation and education, health and gender equality, will the Minister set out whether water and sanitation will be included in and fully integrated into DfID’s upcoming thematic vision documents on gender and education?

A lack of access to clean water has a devastating impact on people’s health, in particular that of children. One of the biggest killers of children under five is a lack of clean water, with a child dying every two minutes due to diarrhoea caused by poor water sanitation and hygiene. As the noble Lord, Lord Leigh, said, investment in access to safe drinking water and sanitation is extremely cost effective. Every £1 spent on improving access to water and sanitation has an estimated £4 return in productivity. It is also estimated that total global economic losses due to inadequate water supply and sanitation services is approximately $260 billion a year. To pick up the point that was made in the debate, ICAI has recommended that DfID adopt sustainability checks to ensure that water services installed are still working 10 years down the line, similar to USAID and the Dutch development agency. Sustainability is critical. What are the Government doing about implementing these recommendations?

As picked up by the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, very low levels of irrigation in sub-Saharan Africa—about 4% of arable land—means that the vast majority of farmers depend on rainfall to water their crops. With climate change making weather patterns in Africa more erratic, this puts them in an increasingly vulnerable position. If rain arrives too early, late or not at all, entire growing seasons can be lost. For many of the poorest smallholders not already irrigating, the first step in developing the productive use of water is improving rainwater harvesting and storage. We heard from the report of the APPG chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, how on-farm ponds and other irrigation methods, such as shallow wells and using pumps, can make a real and substantial difference.

This morning I met Save the Children, which described the rapidly deteriorating situation in Somalia, with an unprecedented fourth failed rainy season in succession. Around $1.8 billion is needed in 2018 to provide support to 5.4 million people. Around 388,000 children are already acutely malnourished. This situation calls for immediate action. Last year we narrowly avoided what could have been a full-scale famine, if it had not been for DfID’s intervention and prompt action.

As we have heard in this debate, we need to build on the humanitarian infrastructure that has been put in place across health, nutrition, water and sanitation. The grim reality is that the cycle of drought, famine and poverty will continue to plague Somalia’s path to stability until we change the arcane rules governing historic debt. Humanitarian financing cannot exclusively be the answer. Ensuring the well-being of Somalia’s children requires long-term planning, institution building and critical investments in health, nutrition and education. I know the Minister is sympathetic to this cause. I urge him and the Government to use their influence to ensure that the World Bank exercises discretion in overlooking the country’s historic, unpayable, and now irrelevant, debt. I, too, welcome the CDC’s briefing for this debate. It is extremely welcome that it is now focusing on means to ensure that enterprise and farming can develop by the use of proper, sustainable support for water.

My noble friend Lady Jones of Whitchurch recently visited Aponic Ltd, which has developed a vertical soil-less growing system that uses 90% less water than traditional agriculture, runs on rain water and solar power and does not emit harmful run-off into the environment. We should be spreading these innovations across the world and helping to install them in Africa to ensure that they change things and that we have a sustainable agricultural system throughout the world. I urge the Government to support such innovation.