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The situation is improving but there is still much to do. Today, March 22, is World Water Day and there is a positive fact: since 1990 about 2.3 billion people have gained access to improved sources of drinking water. According to UNICEF, “the Millennium Development Goal to halve the global proportion of people without access to water has been achieved five years before 2015. However, in the world there are approximately 750 million people without access to drinking water. And there are about 1,000 children die every day from diseases related to unsafe water, lack of sanitation and poor hygiene. The countries in worst condition are the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mozambique and Papua New Guinea where half of the population has no access to improved sources of drinking water. But the situation is delicate in China (112 million people) and India (92 million).
“The stages for access to drinking water, by 1990 represented important progress despite the incredible difficulties – said Sanjay Wijesekera, Head of UNICEF for programs to Water and sanitary services -. But there is still much to do. Water is the very essence of life, and about 750 million people between the poorest and the margins still are denied this basic human right. “
A positive story is told dall’Avsi, the association international volunteers that work that is involved in 136 projects of development cooperation in 30 countries worldwide. Hassan Hammoud is 53 and four children. It ‘a farmer from the village of Khiam, located to the south of Lebanon, in a delicate position of the border with Israel. Hassan cultivates about 14 acres of vegetables and cereals in the plain of Marjayoun-Khiam, a fertile plain of about 1,000 hectares extending from the circle of Christian villages and Shiites to the border with Israel. The region, because of the delicate position, was the scene of the war between Lebanon and Israel in 2006, and right in response to damage caused by the war AVSI began its emergency intervention in the region. Starting in need of access to the most important asset: water. Rehabilitate the open channel that ran through the flat was the priority for all farmers.
Thanks to a project started in 2007 and built by AVSI with the Region of Lombardy and the FAO, 100 farmers, including Hassan , also received water for their crops. E ‘was created an irrigation system modern and at the same time easy to manage, in which the open channels have been replaced by underground channels under pressure, which allowed to cover, with a total length of 16 km of pipes, all the cultivable area of the Plain. Not only that, the water system provides counters in each manhole, drainage channels primary and secondary systems of drip irrigation. The consequences of the project have not only affected the living conditions of farmers, who have returned to cultivate and earn from their work. But he has done important work of reconciliation, reducing conflicts related to divisions of the few sources of water available.
The project was also born a cooperative, Dardara, named for the natural spring that flows into the plain. Christians and Shiites together cultivate the land of Marjayoun.
“Since we established the cooperative, are also able to improve skills of farmer – says today Hassan, one of the first members the cooperative Dardara, who participated in the training for a more efficient use of the resource -. Now, the value of these lands is at least ten times greater than in 2009 and we feel an integral part of this change. “
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