Yes!

Water is very important in all facet of life especially in the rural areas. This because the indigenous depends on water not only for farming to produce for the urban setups but household activities. Without water life will break the indigenous people to migrate to the urban areas for better life resulting in urbanization. Farmland will be left idle thereby reducing food production to meet the economy. The village lacks medical doctors and water shortages will result in use of other poor source of water for drinking resulting to diseases such as cholera, etc. Sanitation, the hygienic means of promoting health through prevention of human contact with for example human wastes such as the treatment and proper disposal of sewage waste water cannot be effectively executed with shortage of water. Many can be said these are just few to open up the discussion.

Hence when problems related water and sanitation at the village level are well dealt with, the indigenous life at the village will be improved. Remember, the urban setup depends largely on food which are produced by the villages and transported to the urban areas.

Personally I think handling water and sanitation problems at the villages will not be as complex as that at the urban areas of which most governments overlook. If you take a look at my publication on "Modelling population growth on public water and sanitation facilities using GIS and statistics: a case study of Aboabo, Ghana" you will understand my point. See link below:

http://web.a.ebscohost.com/ehost/detail?sid=728b94d3-cbcc-4630-8729-d71cffce7fb4%40sessionmgr4002&vid=1&hid=4207&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ%3d%3d#db=aph&AN=82280461

One of the major problem in rural areas in India is the absence of indoor toilets . In addition , safe drinking water is not easily available . The concept of hand wash with soap & water is not practiced , as they are not aware of the benefits . Therefore , HSW ( hand wash , sanitation , safe drinking water ) would make a tremendous impact on health of children & adults by preventing many Infectious diseases . Preventive public health is more important than expensive individual health care Maternal education is essential on these simple steps to improve rural health , but misconceptions & beliefs are also definite hurdles .

Yes. Adequate water supply (quality and quantity) and availability of sanitation facilities in some villages in Nigeria confirm this answer.

Definitely access to improved water is necessary for the prevention and spread of diseases, but more importantly, emphasis needs to be placed on educating the rural populace on the need for ensuring sanitation in there water quality. Development agencies may not cover all the rural localities of the world but with increased awareness and sensitization through the media outlets, rural households may be educated on the benefits of accessing safe drinking water. With this knowledge in place, it may be easier for the rural people to utilize their respectively water purification strategies. In summary, I think is more cost effective, and probably may be more efficient, if rural populace are well educated and enlightened on the benefits of safe drinking water and encouraging them to develop there own indigenous strategies for water purification.

Water and sanitation are basic human rights, and have a positive impact on more than 'just' diarrhoea. With safe and appropriate systems in place, including school facilities the opportunities for education will also improve, especially for girls as they will have to spend less time collecting water and, with appropriate facilities for menstrual hygiene, will be able to attend school more frequently.

Rural development with education the human will not happen if people are ill or do not having an adequate food. But also if people are not educated then they will not conserve or use the resource in right ways.

For the better life in villages, especially in deep rural areas, the quality of water is crucial for better life. But, also if no sanitation there again the water will polluted. So, both of them are crucial to improve life in villages.

Besides water and sanitation: employment, work conditions, education for children, leisure possibilities, medical care, police, transport

Our experience in rural communities occupied by populations of black descendants of slaves (Quilombo Communities) in Brazil shows us that education is paramount. Different communities live with different water sources, rainwater collected in cisterns, wells, rivers. Surely educating for personal hygiene and preservation of water sources is a more efficient strategy.

Yes water and sanitation provision are very vital in the lives of villages. Good quality water ensures good health, and quality sanitation facilities as well. Additionally good sanitation facilities ensures that good time for other activities especially eduction or schooling to be precise, and this relates basically with the girl child.

... To relieve the financial and social burden of sickness and early death - followed by decent work

Http://www.ids.ac.uk/idsresearch/water-and-sanitation

Excellent question! I would say it depends on the village and what their water/san situation is, as well as their education status, and the relative cost of improving each of these. What is the effective cost of water, given its source, time required to fetch it, security risks associated with that, etc.? What about fuel? In other words, is handwashing/water-boiling just too expensive? What if any sanitation systems are now in place in the village, such as pit latrines? What is the sanitation setup at the school, assuming there is one, and do they provide for/teach handwashing? How widespread is open defecation and, if it is a problem, are community health programs campaigning or at least messaging against it? Is there a community health worker who could train mothers of young children on appropriate sanitation and how to protect children from diarrheal disease? I realize this is the dread "it depends" answer, but even if education is the critical factor, adult literacy and second-chance education systems are neither cheap nor quick. Perhaps girls in late primary/middle school should receive in-school training oriented at improving their performance in this area when they become young mothers in the not-too-distant future or even currently as they care for siblings and do the housework.

From a public health perspective safe drinking water and good sanitation are very important, of course, but their value is diminished unless educational and cultural change occurs so that the value of hands washing, utensils washing, disinfection of the 'safe' water (e.g. solar/UV) and other similar practices are generally followed in village life.

I would add from my experience that shifting some of the development effort toward education is necessary including some education focusing on the water and sanitation technology used. The educational program should then be accompanied by continuous, incremental improvements to water and sanitation, always at a level of technology that is good match for the desires and culture of the community, the educational level, and the resources available to make the improvements sustainable.

Electricity,water,sanitation and paved roads are important vehicles for development the Egyptians villages especially those lies away from cities. Most peoples in those villages are farmers and the educated sons go to live in city because facilities in cities are more offer than villages.Effort must be carried out to render village attract people to live and must get ride of snails in irrigated water and prevent human and animal washing in theses waters canals to reduce diseases transmit from polluted water.

The answer is yes. However, community education is equally important to reduce or eliminate bad habits of breastfeeding. allowing children to play and even eat sands. I believe a total (integrated approach) to rural life might be the solution.

Women education is overall the way, after it you can add all the amenities, including at first water sanitation.

Good water and sanitation are essential to health. Th motivation and ability to take advantage of these depends on the educational level of the community. The higher the quality of education the more likely is the drive to better water and sanitation provision. In the poorest areas there is likely to be a low standard of education and so there will be no difference in the correlations. However in urban areas where increasing numbers of people live the ability to live in a higher quality environment vis-a-vis water and sanitation is likely to be higher. I believe that it would be very hard to isolate these influences based on the above likely scenarios.

In my experience the poor know they need good water but are unable to. achieve this without some development or external assistance. The educated may learn to obtain enough money to buy out of the sanitation poverty trap.

Definitely, the two are among the most important needs for rural population. Most importantly they are intertwined, poor sanitation will impact on water quality and inadequate water supply can also impact sanitation. If these two needs together with with energy, education and health are adequately addressed, the social and economic wellbeing of rural communities could be very well augmented.

That is actually a good question. Especially there are a lot of third world and/or developing countries which have similar problems. I think safety and sanitation (access to clean/potable water / sewage and toilets) are some of the most important factors for a village but there is also a need for access to energy/electricity but it comes secondary then educating the village.

The 'education' can be a challenge Lawrence in that outsiders telling locals what do do and not do does not work. Someone from the locale needs to be a catalyst in the change towards use of healthier systems and methods.

Michael, I agree with you. . . usually what I think would be good is that in educating the village (starting from the chief to the people) there is a few number of people who stay with them and teach them the ways for a few days/weeks until they are satisfied with the level of education of the villagers. Usually there is continuous monitoring/ education given by the local governments to help sustain what needs to be sustained.

Water and sanitation are the key to health of the people whether they are educated or not. However health should come first because it is the basic need. However from Malaysian experience both are equally important. In Malaysia most people have basic water needs and access to education is open to everybody even in remote areas.

In developing countries, the provision and maintenance of the social needs of rural populations should be the onus of governments and the communities with back-ups from non-governmental organizations (NGOs). To ensure a sustainable provision of these needs, effective local governance should be guaranteed, i.e. the people should should be directly invovled in the day to day running of their community affairs with budgetary support from central governments. NGOs should also design community development projects in consultation with the local people and based on their felt needs.

The Millennium Development Goals ( MDGs ) were established in the year 2000 to improve the lives of citizens in developing countries . Goal 7 is to ensure environmental sustainability . Target 7c deals with sustainable access to safe drinking water & basic sanitation .Experts have agreed on three priorities : No one should practice open defecation ; every one should have safe water & sanitation facilities at home & practice good hygiene ; all schools & health centers should have water & sanitation faclities & should practice good hygiene . Many of the rural population are poor & definitely needs support from the government to achieve the MDGs . If Goal 2 is able to achieve universal primary education , it should support goal 7 . There has been good progress & by the year 2015 , it would be possible to evaluate the impact made by these goals . But it is funding which is very crucial in determining the success of these essential goals .

We need to have holistic approach to improve quality of life in villages.Its key components should be health,education, connectivity , employment opportunities.In the focus should develop capabilities of residents. Nevertheless, improving sanitation and providing potable drinking water are basic facilities that can have significant impact on health. and productivity.

Provision of potable drinking water and sanitation would check all water born diseases . These are very cost effective.We have modernised about twenty villages using a holistic approach with very satisfying results.

It is not entirely the best approach. You first of all need to do priority study on what is most needed in that particular village. I think it depends on the village in question. However, I think water, economic activity and health should be the best approach. After providing water and sanitation, how can the facility be maintained if the beneficiaries do not have the economic empowerment to contribute towards the maintenance of the facilities. Thank you

I would say that is very important to listen the villagers needs, and at the same time learn about their routines and awareness.

Water is definitely important but not necessary the first priority. You just think on the fact, that building a facility to extract, clean, and deliver water involves economy, governance, electrical power, skills for maintaining the facility, and of course education/awareness for benefit.

Also a neglected water system together with poor sanitation conditions, in a long run can become a focus of diseases.

To me I would say is just a means to better lives which goes along side with other necessities. Singling out water and sanitation as the best would be wrong. The whole thing lies in the economic status of individuals.

There is no conflict between these two education and sanitation. In fact if we improve education status of rural people their access to sanitation and adoption of safe sanitation practice would also improve. There is another problem here that is the time taken for improving levels of education and it getting translated into adoption of safe water and sanitation practices. How much time it will take to improve the education status of adult parents. Definitely It would take long time. But we can improve access to sanitation facilities and protected water supply in the villages by provision of them in a short period say 3-6 months. We can also enhance the public awareness on water and sanitation with participatory practices within this period.So it is desirable to focus on sanitation and water at grassroots level along with fighting for improving the access of education to all especially girls.

Rural development requires both macro stratgey as well as local components. We have discussed these issues in Rural Development in Punjab--A success Story Going Astray, Routledge London,2007. Chapter 2 and last Section containing 5 chapters are particularly relevant. I get a lot of requests to make the book or chapters available through research gate. But the publishers do not permit archiving full texts.However, the book can be easily accessed across the world through major libraries or easily purchased for libraries from the publishers.

From zoonotic point of view it is important to design sanitation measures to break the connection between the source of infection and the susceptible individuals and must include general sanitation measures such as: 1- chlorination of water supplies,

2- pasteurization of milk, 3- supervision and inspection of food and people who handle food, 4- destruction of arthropods vector 5- treatment of sewage.

Every citizen should receive basic needs such as fresh air, potable drinking water, sufficient balanced diet/ food and shelter, which fall under fundamental human right. More over he/she should get free secondary level education, health services, employment opportunities and live and work at good environment having satisfactory health and sanitation. Every citizen spends his/her earnings primarily on food, clothes, house, utilities, health and education. Livelihood improvement or better life could be achieved only when if there is regular income or income generating activities and savings i.e, difference between earnings and expenditure. About 80% rural population of developing countries are suffering from water borne diseases such as diarrhea, cholera, jaundice, hepatitis etc. So, livelihood and life expectancy of the village people could be partly improved if safe drinking water supplied and environmental sanitation maintained.

For providing or receiving safe drinking water and having good environmental sanitation have to adopt an integrated or holistic approach. It is necessary to have an appropriate policy/ rule and regulation formulation, consider socioeconomic, information dissemination and public awareness raising campaign, technical, technological, environmental, legal and implementation aspects to achieve the goal.

Watershed/ river basin management/ integrated water quality management and raw drinking water and sewage treatment, proper solid waste management with sanitary landfill site are essential to have safe drinking water and environmental sanitation which improves the quality of life of the people.

When we talk about villages we may be talking about the associated poverty, malnourishment, disease, lack of basic infrastructure, lack of political power.. and yes of course lack of water and good sanitation should be included in the package. What may be taken for granted in well established cities such as access to clean water and good sanitation can be quite hard to come by in villages. The search for water, a basic life necessity, can be the source of increased hardship particularly to children and women on a daily basis. Lack of water combined with lack of sanitation exacerbates the spread of water borne illnesses and possibly endemic water based diseases. The synergy with poverty and lack of basic medical facilities in villages can mean infant mortality and morbidity. where there is plenty of water the situation may be better but still unprotected source combined with lack of sanitation can convert a source to a medium for transmission of diseases. Often in villages projects dealing with water and sanitation services operate in an institutional and financial vacuum and require thinking from scratch in terms of the technical, financial, operation, management, institutional and other aspects. Sustainability of services is a major issue. Financing water and sanitation services and ensuring continuity of services is simply not simple.

Yea, as it is pointed out in most comments. Mostly the issue of water and sanitation is one of the priorities in villages. But it is very unfair to generalize as such approach will improve life in village. Thus it is an issue which should be answered after a participatory need assessment, community appraisal and detailed context analysis.

Engineering/Science principles should be combined with changing behavior patterns to make the villages more environmentally conscious. Dr Sam Ham of the University of Idaho has developed persuasive communication techniques that drive behavior change. These techniques are referred to as thematic communication and they have been very helpful in changing the behavior patterns of people in Townsville, Australia and other locations to become world leaders in sustainability. All the engineering and science would not work if we are not willing to adopt sustainable practices with regards to the environment. For example I did some preliminary groundwork in the US for the Yamuna Action Project in India to clean up the River Yamuna, major tributary of the Ganges River. We had all these grand ideas about wastewater treatment facilities to remove nutrients from the wastewater, using biofilters, etc. However if we had focused first on the low tech approach of a communications campaign to encourage the villagers to not dump their waste in the river, especially during the dry season with low water levels making the conditions septic, then we could have solved most of the problems.

I have devised a method of Pastuerising water in villages using a hollow tube grid over the cooking fire - used to hold cooking utensils - which recirculates water through a small plate heat exchanger using natural convection. The water only needs to reach 60°C (140°F) to kill all Pathogens except Hepatitis A virus. The same system can be desinged to utilise waste heat from generator exhausts etc. Go to www.htmarine.com.au for an overview.

Water and sanitation are very important factors to improving the human life. Though these could help improve lives in villages, they are could also not be the best approaches. A lot of factors should be considered in arriving at the best approaches to improve lives in villages. For example, what are the preferred needs of the villages? What type of villages are involved? etc. Nevertheless, i believe getting villages along in creating interventions and most importantly, encouraging and teaching villages to use their own resources to build their lives could make a lasting positive impact in their lives.

water and sanitation are the most essential needs of most villages. this stem from the fact that most diseases affecting the rural folks are mostly water borne or lack of proper sanitation. Remember cholera, dysentry, malaria just to mention a few are all related to sanitation or lack of good drinking water.

But if a survey was to be conducted in most villages, their needs and wants may not necessarily be 'good sanitation and clean water', just because they attribute most of the sickness and diseases to some strange diety somewhere. Remember GOOD health leads to good LIFE

To tackle diarrhea, one has to take a multi-faceted approach . The provision of portable water and sanitation will definitely help but as Edward Martey rightly said, the operation and maintenance of the facilities provided must be very easy to understand by the villagers therefore stakeholders should be part of the choice of sanitation process and water treatment technology else even the best approach can prove futile. This method is currently being advocated in the solid waste management schemes in most rural communities and stake holder involvement and participation in sanitation policies is giving very positive results.

Our experience also suggests that improvement in sanitation and availability of potable drinking water results in significant reduction in water borne diseases. I agree with Ebi that involvement of beneficiaries in village life improvement projects in construction,,operation and maintenance is a necessary condition for ensuring expected outcome. Some contribution by beneficiaries would ensure efficient management of completed infrastructure. Appropriate technology for waste manage- -ment at local level is available that can be adapted to local conditions. The involvement of local communities would also facilitate training local manpower for construction and maintenance.

Yes, good quality water and hygiene are two basic inputs to ensure healthy growth of children, and minimise malnutrition, which has a direct bearing on rural health and education.

Provide the location with proper electricity, may be by using renewable, as availability of electricity will help them to get water and adopt better hygienic habits

In my opinion:

Safe water = Healthy life (Health comes prior to all other things)

and

Safe sanitation also play an important role in improving the village life.

The development in rural areas should not be limited to these two factors as most of the people commented.

We can add more things according to the villager's need but comparing these two particular factors with other things will not be justified.

Sanitation and provision potable drinking water should be essential elements of integrated village development project. Upgrading school education, imparting skills and ,connectivity with the wider world should also be considered equally important.

However,, involvement of community in the development process would revive and strengthen social capital,generate social skills,that is, incubate social entrepreneurs,creating a fertile ground ground for sustainable development.

We can learn only from social practices to formulate correct strategies.Thomas Kuhn rightly argues that science has to be understood as a social practice and only afterwards an intellectual endeavor.

Each village community is unique so to speak. So development plan formulation would require identification of logic of the situation as the basis for action.

I would say yes, exactly because in developing countries more than 80% disease are from water borne diseases which facilitates child and infant mortality, short life expectancy and low performance of the productive generation.

I had been working in rural water supplementation projects for five years. And the project is handed over to the community at the end of the completion of all activities. However, within the project implementation participation and taking community as stack holder (mostly on kind) to feel ownership of the project is essential.

Concerning the administration of the project after handed over to the community:- what we have done is we (community and stack holders) formulate one committee to manage the system. We train the committee and participate even from the start-up of the project until completion. And they are all able to manage and maintain the system until now. As a result the water borne diseases in the villages is almost eradicated. And the health reports from the village clinics assured that there is effective out come from the project on health issues if the villages.

Water care is important but not sufficient. Energy is very important in modern life, but what is better now is a clean and non poluente energy. Indeed, with all the facilities you may be, we can not live in a polluted environment. In a word it takes a sustainable environment with clean, renewable energy to quiet and hoped a good life.

Integrated development is what is needed to upgrade conditions in villages.

Good question and point. Without capacity development in integrated natural resources management, sustainable development can not be achieved, especially in rural and semi-urban areas. Just supplying water and sanitation facilities will not lead for sustainable development and will not help in reducing health and sanitation issues and rural poverty. Supplying of infrastructures and capacity development in sustainable management should be given equal priority [50:50].

How is important the clean water, please have a look on attached link: http://www.worldvisionwater.org/

http://www.worldvisionwater.org/

Considering the 5 F Diagram and the deadly Feacal-Oral Route transmission, the Sanitation Practices are the most powerful BARRIER to protect us from further transmission or contamination from Water Borne Diseases.

Moreover, Water is considered as Elixir of Life and SAFE Water protects / save Lives.

So everyone should pledge for "WASH for All :: All for WASH".

So the WASH practices are the Best Approaches to enhance the quality of Life, especially and more importantly in the villages.

Thanks and Regards.

Nripendra Kumar Sarma

Nagaon, Assam, India

It is no doubt that provision of appropriate water and sanitation infrastructure will contribute to improved living conditions in villages. The main challenge is how water and sanitation is provided, i.e. how it is developed in the village. Based on experiences from southern Africa I have several examples of failed attempts to address these issues. If technology/infrastructure is just provided without any involvement of the inhabitants of the village then the outcome can be rather disappointing. It is therefore very important that beneficiaries are involved in the process from the beginning, taking part in the planning, construction and later the operations and maintenance in these systems. If not, then the risk is that most systems just fall apart after a while due to lack of ownership and involvement of users and limited resources of local and regional authorities to maintain infrastructures.

As we know about 75 % diseases in the rural areas specially in developing countries are directly or indirectly related to water borne diseases. So a better sanitation and water condition will definitely improve the lives of villagers.

Till now some villages in Egypt do not have drainage system. So, I think to improve water in village must be accompanied with good drainage system,energy, asphalt paved roads and sanitation to improve live in village.

So far some villages do not have drainage system. So , i think water sanitation must be accompanied with good drainage system,energy,asphalt paved roads and public health

hygienic measures to improve live in village.

It is wrong to view water and sanitation solely as a health intervention that prevents diarrhoea (for which there is still no concluisve evidence anyway, see http://wp.me/paGBZ-2zf). Household water and sanitation services deliver important economic impacts thanks to time & cost savings, e.g. less tme needed for water collection and queuing for public toilets, the poor often pay more water than the rich who make use of subsidised piped water systems. Multiple use water systems for both drinking water and small-scale irrigation help generate income, just as ecological sanitation systems that produce biogas & fertilisers. There are also important social benefits: girl school attendance drops when there are no toilets and menstrual hygiene facilities, women and girls face sexual abuse and harassment if they have to practice open defecation.

Awareness and education would be vital so that villagers can take their own precautions against contamination and diseases for example; we have to educate villagers about what is good water and what is bad water. However, surface water in third world countries (Indian subcontinent) could be contaminated with both biological and chemical pollutants and even underground water is contaminated with arsenic. In this situation what would be the best approach? Innovation of simple, economical (affordable) and easy transferable technology would be crucial, for example research shows that using and filtering surface water with ‘sari clothes (clothes wear by women) can prevent cholera in Bangladesh!

What about off-grid power generation:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260795393_Mechatronic_platform_with_12m2_solar_thermal_concentrator_for_rural_power_generation_in_Africa?ev=pub_cit_inc

Article Mechatronic Platform with 12m2 Solar Thermal Concentrator fo...

It is definitively one of the best approach to improving lives in villages, given the relationship between water, sanitation, and health. Sanitation should not be a complicated matter. The village can understand easily the importance of sanitation and people would apply whatever appropriate technology without a problem. However, when people think of access to water, there is one important element that is always missing in the equation. That is the quality of the water provided to the village. It is simply not enough to dug a well and put a pump on it and think that the problem is solved. For a well, the biological quality of the water may be OK, although it needs to be checked and monitored over time. The more important thing of concern is the chemical quality of the water from the well. This should be the first condition that needs to be examined before putting the well in the hand of the village people. When it is all done, the next question is how much the village is prepared to assume the responsibility for the continued flow and quality of the water. If all of this is not thought through before the project is implemented, the idea is a failure from the starting point.

Water, sanitation and good health practice is very important in the rural environment, but to me sound education and proper sensitization about the environment is the driving force for survival in the rural communities. It is when this is done that the dwellers of rural communities will see the importance of potable water and proper sanitation of his/her immediate environment in life.

yes ,environmental health is important