Every year, the government suffers a loss of Rs 112 billion due to environmental degradation and poor implementation of National Water and Sanitation Policy. "We are facing a serious water challenge, as Pakistan ranked 80th in water quality out of 122 nations. As a result, the government has to spend about Rs 20 billion annually on medication for water borne diseases," said Federal Minister for Environment, Hameed Ullah Jan Afridi.
He was addressing the participants of a one day Stakeholders Consultative Workshop for Development of Management Information System (MIS) for Water and Sanitation and launch of Water and Sanitation (WATSAN) website organised by Ministry of Environment in collaboration with United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef) here on Thursday.
Pakistan is a front-line state coming to grip with the serious concerns of climate change. Thus there are serious threats to water availability. These anticipated water shortages have adverse implication on safe drinking water sources. He added that the picture of sanitation sector in Pakistan was also not very encouraging.
Afridi said licenses of those firms would be cancelled through Engineering Council that were found involved in violation of the Environmental Act. He said the inauguration of the WATSAN website will help collect and disseminate the maximum data of the Ministry of Environment, besides keeping its customers updated about the performance of the ministry and enhancing its co-ordination between provincial ministries.
"The basic purpose of launching WATSAN website is to provide a reliable source of information containing all the water and sanitation related policies and documents," he said. Afridi said these initiatives would enable us to meet the millennium development goals. Formulating the approval of National Drinking Water Policy 2009 and National Sanitation Policy 2007, the ministry has provided a framework towards addressing the issues, he added.
He said about 86 percent of the population in Pakistan has no access to clean drinking water which is a matter of great concern. Afridi announced that the Ministry would administer MIS at the Water and Sanitation Directorate, which will soon be established.
Speaking on the occasion Secretary Environment Javed Malik said this was compounded with the fact that Pakistan was being categorised as water stressed country. Therefore, the development of a MIS at national level is a timely intervention of the Ministry for Environment. However, it is prudent to have similar MIS at provincial and regional/district levels thus making full use of the system. It is a proven fact that a fully functional MIS is an effective tool for efficient planning and policy making.
He thanked the Unicef for its long-standing partnership with the ministry in this regard. He reaffirmed the government commitment to help improve the lives of those without access to safe water and sanitation facilities, adding that due to the concerted step of an MIS development will ensure better planning and rational decision making and permit long term gains towards meeting Millennium Development Goals. Secretary hoped that the recommendations of today's workshop would enable in finalising our future course of action. Later, the Minister for Environment inaugurated the WATSAN website.
Comments
Comments are closed.