NMICS 2010 Report - Central Bureau of Statistics

VI.Water and SanitationSafe drinking water and proper sanitation and hygiene practices are basic necessities for goodhealth. Unsafe drinking water can be a significant carrier of diseases such as trachoma, cholera,typhoid and schistosomiasis. Drinking water can also be tainted with chemical, physical andradiological contaminants with harmful effects on human health. In addition to its association withdisease, access to drinking water may be particularly important for women and children, especiallyin rural areas, who bear the primary responsibility for carrying water, often from long distances.Proper sanitation and hygiene can significantly reduce the incidence of diseases such as diarrhoea,polio and acute respiratory infections.The MDG target is to reduce the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinkingwater and basic sanitation by half between 1990 and 2015. The WFFC goal calls for a reduction inthe proportion of households without access to hygienic sanitation facilities and affordable and safedrinking water by at least one third. The Government of Nepal’s national goal is to achieve universalcoverage of water supply and sanitation services by 2017.Indicators used for water, sanitation and hygiene in NMICS 2010 are as follows.Use of improved source of drinking waterUse of appropriate water treatment methodTime taken to collect drinking water from sourcePerson collecting drinking waterUse of improved sanitation facilitiesSanitary disposal of child’s faecesPresence of water and soap at place for hand-washingDistance between latrine and hand-washing placeFor more details on water and sanitation and to access some reference documents, please visit theUNICEF Childinfo website http://www.childinfo.org/wes.html.Use of improved drinking water sourcesTable WS.1 shows the proportion of the population by source of drinking water. Improved sourcesinclude piped water (into dwelling, compound, yard or plot, public tap/standpipe), tubewell/borehole, protected well, protected spring, and rainwater collection/harvesting. Unimprovedsources include unprotected well, unprotected spring, tanker or truck, and surface water. Bottledwater is considered an improved water source only if the household is uses water from an improvedsource for other purposes such as cooking and personal hygiene.Overall, 83 percent of the population in the MFWR used an improved source of drinking water.There was little variation by region or education of household head. Subregionally, the highestproportion was in the Far Western Terai (99 percent) and the lowest proportion was in the FarWestern Mountains (70 percent). The urban population (91 percent) was more likely to use animproved source of drinking water than the rural population (82 percent). The use of an improvedsource of drinking water was positively associated with the economic status of the household.People living in the richest households (96 percent) were more likely to use an improved source ofdrinking water than people in the poorest households (64 percent).About one third (30 percent) of the population in the MFWR used public tap/standpipe as animproved source; this was followed by tube well/handpump without a platform (17 percent) andtube well/handpump with a platform (16 percent). Some one in 10 (10 percent) use an unprotectedspring for drinking water (an unimproved source).80