Ghana has been named among top 10 countries worldwide with a highest percentage of 85.7 of its population without decent toilets.
This amounts to over 23 million people who suffer the fear and indignity of relieving themselves in the open or in unsafe or unhygienic toilets. This is contained in a reported entitled ‘Out of Order’ released by WaterAid, an international Non-Governmental Organization on its 2017 state of the world’s toilets.
According to the report, copied to A1radioonline.com by Communications and Campaign Officer of WaterAid Ghana, Yvonne Kafui Nyaku, the lack of decent toilets around the world prevents women and girls from fulfilling their potential.
‘Out of Order’ is WaterAid’s third-annual analysis of the world’s toilets. It reveals that globally, one in 3 people still have nowhere decent to go to the toilet and demonstrates how women and girls bear the brunt of this global crisis.
For more than 1.1 billion women and girls, this injustice results in an increased risk of poor health, limited education, harassment and even attack.
Among the other findings, all 10 of the world’s worst countries for access to basic sanitation are in sub-Saharan Africa, where only 28% of people have a decent toilet, and children are 14 times more likely to die before the age of five than in developed regions. Djibouti, a major route for refugees from the Yemen war, has the worst figures for open defecation, with a 7.2% increase since 2000.
The report stated “Cambodia has emerged from decades of conflict to become one of the fastest growing economies in Asia. It comes second for progress in reducing open defecation as well as improving access to basic sanitation.”
“Between 2000 and 2015, the number of people in the world defecating in the open dropped from 1.2 billion (20% of the global population) to 892 million (12%). Despite this progress, it is still a huge problem, resulting in enough faeces to fill seven bathtubs every second going into the environment untreated” it captured. Ghana recently launched a sanitation campaign aimed to address poor sanitation situation.
But WaterAid Ghana fears that “without adequate funds, the plans outlined to fight the sanitation menace may not be fully implemented.”
In commemoration of World Toilet Day, WaterAid Ghana is calling on government to invest more money and spend it transparently and efficiently, paying particular attention to the needs of women and girls. The NGO also entreats government to promote the value of sanitation for gender equality and female empowerment, and involve women as leaders to ensure solutions address the challenges women and girls face.
“Improve coordination to create gender-friendly toilets in all schools, healthcare facilities, work environments and public spaces.” WaterAid also call on government to “combine plans to improve access to sanitation with efforts to redistribute water and hygiene work, which is predominantly the responsibility of women and girls.”
photo credit: WaterAid Ghana
By: Joshua Asaah|A1radioonline.com|Ghana
