Sustainable Development Goal
6

Clean Water and Sanitation

Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all.

While substantial progress has been made in increasing access to clean drinking water and sanitation, billions of people—mostly in rural areas—still lack these basic services. Worldwide, one in three people do not have access to safe drinking watertwo out of five people do not have a basic hand-washing facility with soap and water, and more than 673 million people still practice open defecation.

The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated the critical importance of sanitation, hygiene and adequate access to clean water for preventing and containing diseases. Hand hygiene saves lives. According to the World Health Organization, handwashing is one of the most effective actions you can take to reduce the spread of pathogens and prevent infections, including the COVID-19 virus. Yet billions of people still lack safe water sanitation, and funding is inadequate.

 

COVID-19 response

Availability and access to water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services is fundamental to fighting the virus and preserving the health and well-being of millions. COVID-19 will not be stopped without access to safe water for people living in vulnerability, UN experts said. 

The impacts of COVID-19 could be considerably higher on the urban poor living in slums, who don’t have access to clean water. UN-Habitat is working with partners to facilitate access to running water and  handwashing in informal settlements

UNICEF is urgently appealing for funding and support to reach more girls and boys with basic water, sanitation and hygiene facilities, especially those children who are cut off from safe water because they live in remote areas, or in places where water is untreated or polluted, or because they are without a home, living in a slum or on the street.

In response to the COVID-19 outbreak, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) is adjusting its WASH services to prevent the spread of the disease. This includes continued support to affected, at-risk, low-capacity and fragile countries to secure WASH services and infection prevention control in health facilities. 

Read more about the work in response to COVID-19 by UN-Water members and partners.  

Source: https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/water-and-sanitation/

Entities

FAO
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
IOM
International Organization for Migration
UN-Habitat
United Nations Human Settlements Programme
UNDP
United Nations Development Programme
UNFPA
United Nations Population Fund
UNHCR
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
UNICEF
United Nations Children’s Fund
WHO
World Health Organization

Implementing partners

CSO
Ministry of health
Ministry of Construction, Housing and Public Municipalities
Ministry of Municipalities and tourism
Direct implementation
Permanent Committee of Ministry of Interior
Local contractor
Ministry of Water resource
WHO
MoI

Investing Partners

Australia-DFAT
Netherlands
Germany
DFID
Japan
Europe Union
Multilateral Donor
WHO Internal Fund
The United Nations Development Programme
US-CT Bureau

Our work on SDG 6 is linked to these other Sustainable Development Goals: