Islamabad: Bangladesh has better sanitation facilities than Pakistan, but both are miles ahead of India.
That is what country papers presented at the second South Asian Conference on Sanitation 2006 (SACOSAN-2006) being held in Islamabad would have you believe.
As per the papers, which have been referred to by the Daily Times, only 38 per cent of India's population has access to sanitation facilities, whereas in Bangladesh and Pakistan, nearly 60 per cent and 42 per cent of the population has access to similar facilities.
Myanmar tops the list with 82 per cent, followed by Sri Lanka (76 per cent), Bangladesh (59.53 per cent), Pakistan (42 per cent), Nepal (39 per cent) and India (38 per cent).
All these countries are committed to the millennium development goals (MDGs) set at the World Summit on Sustainable Development at Johannesburg in 2002, the figures for Pakistan show that 45 per cent households do not have access to a latrine, while another 51 per cent households lack drainage facilities.
Around 35 per cent dispose of their wastewater into open drains and 16 per cent are connected to underground sewerage or drains. Around 30 per cent of the urban population of the country lives in makeshift dwellings with inadequate sanitation facilities.
In India as per the latest census data (2001), only 36.4 per cent of the total population has latrines attached to their houses. However in the rural areas, only 21.9 per cent of the population has latrines attached to their houses out of which only 7.1 per cent households have latrines with water closets, which are the most sanitized toilets.
Bangladesh had conducted a national baseline survey in October 2003 to assess the extent of sanitation coverage, which revealed that out of a total number of 21.3 million families in the country, only 7.1 million families (33.23 pc) were using hygienic latrines.
The paper on Bangladesh says that a after a multi-media awareness campaign that also included country, divisional and district orientation workshops for sensitising and motivating stakeholders towards contributing to the national sanitation.
As a result of these moves the county has now been able to achieve 59.53 percent coverage at the end of June 2005, which is an increase of about 26.32 percent from the baseline in October 2003.
The government has publicly announced its resolve to achieve 100 percent sanitation for all by 2010, the paper says.
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