African Water Development Report 2006 - United Nations Economic ...

African Water Development Report 2006Progress in and Current Levels of Accessto Improved Water Supply andSanitationSince 1990, there has been some progress in thenumber of people with access to improved watersupply and sanitation in Africa but the percentageof coverage did not increase much due to theconsiderable increases in population. Accordingto the WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programmein 2004, in sub-Saharan Africa someprogress was made in the rural areas where 69million more people gained access to water supplyin rural settings during the period 1990-2002(over 9 per cent).Although the percentage of people served inthe urban areas did not change during the sameperiod, 82 million more people gained accessto water supply in towns. The percentage of thesupply increase was offset by that of the urbandemographic growth and rural-urban migrationwhich increased the population of towns/citiesby 100 million more people. In northern Africa,some progress was also made in the rural areaswhere coverage increased by 2 per cent, risingfrom 82 per cent to 84 per cent.During the same period, while about a millionmore people were served with improved watersupply in urban areas, the urban population in-Fig. 5.22: Population served and notserved with improved water supplysources - 1990Fig. 5.23: Population served and notserved with improved water supplysources - 2002Source: WHO/UNICEF JMP, 2004Fig. 5.24: Population served and notserved with improved sanitation - 1990Fig. 5.25: Population served and notserved with improved sanitation - 2002106Source: WHO/UNICEF JMP, 2004