Water Supply & Sanitation Coverage Figures

Limitations of Coverage Assessment

The Difficulties

Determining the coverage figures for water supply and sanitation in the developing world is a difficult if not impossible task. There are an number of reasons for this. These are primarily:

Political - governments do not wish to be identified as providing inadequate services so figures are often inflated.

Technical - to accurately establish service levels requires an ongoing process of information gathering and analysis which requires resources and capacity which are generally not available.

Standards - everybody is drinking water of some form (death from thirst is rare) and using some form of sanitation practice. Coverage figures are only relevant if the same standard of service is counted in all cases - this is unlikely to be the case.

Dereliction - most coverage figures are based of construction projects and institutional/agency figures which generally will not account for high dereliction rates as the sustainability of services is generally a major problem.

Generally coverage figures are over estimated.

These difficulties are referred to in the World Health Organization Global Water Supply and Sanitation Assessment 2000 noted below.

The Global Water Supply and Sanitation Assessment 2000

The WHO and UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme for Water Supply and Sanitation (JMP) provides a snapshot of water supply and sanitation worldwide at the turn of the millennium using information available from different sources. From 2001 the JMP database – for both historic data and future projections – will be periodically updated. All assistance in identifying unused and new data to improve the estimates presented here is welcome.

WHO Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

Water supply - statistics
Water resources development
Sanitation - statistics
WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme for Water Supply and Sanitation (ISBN 92 4 156202 1) (NLM classificatrion: WA 675)

Report Contents (WHO Site)

Global Coverage Figures

Top

Water Supply & Sanitation Assessment

REGION	1990 Population (millions)				2000 Population (millions)
	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served²	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served
GLOBAL	(76% of global population represented)				(89% of global population represented)
Urban water supply	2 292	2 179	113	95	2 845	2 672	173	94
Rural water supply	2 974	1 961	1 013	66	3 210	2 284	926	71
Total water supply	5 266	4 140	1 126	79	6 055	4 956	1 099	82

Urban sanitation	2 292	1 877	415	82	2 845	2 442	403	86
Rural sanitation	2 974	1 028	1 946	35	3 210	1 210	2 000	38
Total sanitation	5 266	2 905	2 361	55	6 055	3 652	2 403	60

REGION	1990 Population (millions)				2000 Population (millions)
	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served²	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served
AFRICA	(72% of regional population represented)				(96% of regional population represented)
Urban water supply	197	166	31	84	297	253	44	85
Rural water supply	418	183	235	44	487	231	256	47
Total water supply	615	349	266	57	784	484	300	62

Urban sanitation	197	167	30	85	297	251	46	84
Rural sanitation	418	206	212	49	487	220	267	45
Total sanitation	615	373	242	61	784	471	313	60

REGION	1990 Population (millions)				2000 Population (millions)
	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served²	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served
ASIA	(88% of regional population represented)				(94% of regional population represented)
Urban water supply	1 029	972	57	94	1 352	1 254	98	93
Rural water supply	2 151	1 433	718	67	2 331	1 736	595	75
Total water supply	3 180	2 405	775	76	3 683	2 990	693	81

Urban sanitation	1 029	690	339	67	1 352	1 055	297	78
Rural sanitation	2 151	496	1 655	23	2 331	712	1 619	31
Total sanitation	3 180	1 186	1 994	37	3 683	1 767	1 916	48

REGION	1990 Population (millions)				2000 Population (millions)
	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served²	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served
LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN(77% of regional population represented)					(99% of regional population represented)
Urban water supply	313	287	26	92	391	362	29	93
Rural water supply	128	72	56	56	128	79	49	62
Total water supply	441	359	82	82	519	441	78	85

Urban sanitation	313	267	46	85	391	340	51	87
Rural sanitation	128	50	78	39	128	62	66	49
Total sanitation	441	317	124	72	519	402	117	78

REGION	1990 Population (millions)				2000 Population (millions)
	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served²	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served
OCEANIA	(64% of regional population represented)				(85% of regional population represented)
Urban water supply	18	18	0	100	21	21	0	98
Rural water supply	8	5	3	62	9	6	3	63
Total water supply	26	23	3	88	30	27	3	88

Urban sanitation	18	18	0	99	21	21	0	99
Rural sanitation	8	7	1	89	9	7	2	81
Total sanitation	26	25	1	96	30	28	2	93

REGION	1990 Population (millions)				2000 Population (millions)
	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served²	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served
EUROPE	(15% of regional population represented)				(44% of regional population represented)
Urban water supply	522	522	0	100	545	542	3	100
Rural water supply	200	199	1	100	184	161	23	87
Total water supply	722	721	1	100	729	703	26	96

Urban sanitation	522	522	0	100	545	537	8	99
Rural sanitation	200	199	1	100	184	137	47	74
Total sanitation	722	721	1	100	729	674	55	92

REGION	1990 Population (millions)				2000 Population (millions)
	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served²	Total population	Population served	Population unserved	% served
NORTHERN AMERICA	(99.9% of regional population represented)				(99.9% of regional population represented)
Urban water supply	213	213	0	100	239	239	0	100
Rural water supply	69	69	0	100	71	71	0	100
Total water supply	282	282	0	100	310	310	0	100

Urban sanitation	213	213	0	100	239	239	0	100
Rural sanitation	69	69	0	100	71	71	0	100
Total sanitation	282	282	0	100	310	310	0	100