World Day for Water: 22 March $10 billion worth of clean water down the drain

Geneva

This year World Day for Water focuses on water for development. Worldwide, some 2.4 billion people still lack access to basic sanitation and 1.2 billion, or one in five, lack safe drinking water. In Europe alone, 120 million people, i.e. one in seven of the population, do not have access to safe drinking water and adequate sanitation. At the same time precious water continues to be wasted and polluted.

World Day for Water this year also coincides with the 10th anniversary of two environmental conventions of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) intended, directly or indirectly, to conserve and protect our water resources: the Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes and the Convention on the Transboundary Effects of Industrial Accidents. As he takes stock, Mr Kaj Bärlund, UNECE Environment Director, says 'people, industry and agriculture are all competing for the same scarce resource. Unfortunately, leaking pipes, cuts in water supply, contaminated drinking water and water-borne disease are still common, even in the so-called developed world. This represents a huge waste. In the UNECE region as a whole, the direct cost in terms of clean water that is unaccounted for, because it is lost during distribution for instance, has been estimated at some $10 billion a year.'

One particular concern is the discharge of persistent organic pollutants, such as aldrin, dieldrin, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). High concentrations of these substances have long been associated with a number of carcinogenic and other health effects. But much more subtle effects can also occur at environmental concentrations which may be the result of waste-water discharges or runoff from agriculture.

Industrial accidents can also threaten water supplies and devastate aquatic life, as was illustrated by the accident at Baia Mare in northern Romania in January 2000, when the Aurul mining company accidentally spilled over 100,000 cubic metres of cyanide-polluted water, which entered the Tisza, one of Hungary's largest rivers. Several countries are still counting the cost of the devastation, as the spill affected not only Hungary's environment, but also that of the Danube's other downstream countries.

The polluter must pay

To make sure that polluters pay for the havoc they wreak, the UNECE is working out a civil liability regime to industrial accidents that cause transboundary water pollution. It will fill one of the big gaps in international environmental legislation and have the potential to prevent accidents from happening in the first place. It should be ready for adoption by Environment Ministers at their next conference in Kiev in May 2003.

Finally, the UNECE will continue to organize response exercises to mitigate the transboundary effects of industrial accidents. This year, it is simulating an industrial accident on the border between Poland and the Russian Federation (Kaliningrad region) to improve the preparedness on both sides of the border, and protect the health and the environment of local people.

For further information, please contact:

Rainer ENDERLEIN

UNECE Environment Division

Palais des Nations, Office 313

CH - 1211 Geneva 10

Phone: +41(0)22 917 23 73

Fax: +41(0)22 917 01 07

E-mail: rainer.enderlein@unece.org

Sergiusz LUDWICZAK

UNECE Environment Division

Palais des Nations, Office 409

CH - 1211 Geneva 10

Phone: +41(0)22 917 31 74

Fax: +41(0)22 917 01 07

E-mail: sergiusz.ludwiczak@unece.org

Ref. ECE/ENV/02/01