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UN PUBLICATIONSJuly 2011Accounting for Health Impacts of Climate Change  This study aims to improve the understanding of the human health dimensions of climate change and how projects in areas other than health, such as agriculture, water financing programs, and disaster risk reduction need to account explicitly for the health impacts of their interventions. In addition to raising awareness about the projected impacts of climate change on health among policy makers and the civil society of developing countries, this study presents a framework showing the relationship between climate change and health issues in agriculture, water projects, and disaster risk reduction projects. This framework recognizes that climate change will affect all sectors and integrates climate-related health risk into adaptation strategies. As an integrated framework of assessing impacts, this framework can be used to provide guidance to decision makers to deal with climate change impacts and could serve as basis for climate change adaptation policy for each sector.
At the Crossroads. Climate Change Adaptation and Disaster Risk Reduction in Asia and the Pacific. A Review of the Region's Institutional and Policy Landscape  This report provides a snapshot of how Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) and Climate Change Adaptation (CCA) are undertaken and integrated, if at all, in Asia and the Pacific. It does so by taking stock of past and ongoing regional initiatives (Chapter 2) and by looking into the role of certain organizations in the implementation process (Chapter 3). It also discusses key developments in three areas—political, policy and institutional— which are instrumental in facilitating the integration of DRR and CCA agendas in the region (Chapter 4). Concluding remarks and next steps to push the integration forward are presented in the last section (Chapter 5). The report intends to contribute to improved regional planning and programming for DRR and CCA, and highlights areas for cooperation among regional and sub-regional organizations. It also aims to support both national and regional stakeholders in DRR and CCA, such as governments, UN agencies, intergovernmental organizations, research and technical organizations, nongovernment organizations in order to enhance regional planning, programming, and cooperation.
Bringing Water to Where it is Needed Most. Innovative private sector participation in water and sanitation  This "Smart Lessons" brochure introduces a diverse range of initiatives from across the World Bank Group. The variety of lessons learned and experiences presented range from the Water Footprints Network that supports businesses improving their water use efficiency to the innovative financing mechanisms enabling the expansion of rural water access in Kenya.
Desertification: A Visual Synthesis  This book is intended as a basic information kit that tells "the story" of desertification, land degradation and drought at the global scale, together with a comprehensive set of graphics. The book indicates trends as they have taken place over the last decades, combining and connecting issues, and present priorities. It also provides information on the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) and how it works to forge a global partnership to reverse and prevent desertification/land degradation and to mitigate the effects of drought in affected areas in order to support poverty reduction and environmental sustainability.
Malawi: Lilongwe urban profile  Lilongwe is the fastest growing city in Malawi. This report first presents a general background of the urban sector in Lilongwe. The background includes data on administration, urban planning, the economy, the informal and the private sector, poverty, infrastructure, water, sanitation, public transport, street lighting, energy, health, and education. It then makes a synthetic assessment of eight thematic areas including: governance, local economic development, land, gender, environment, slums and shelter, basic urban services, and waste management in terms of the institutional set-up, regulatory framework, resource mobilization, and performance; this second section also highlights agreed priorities and includes a list of identified projects. Finally, it presents a SWOT analysis and an outline of priority project proposals for each theme.
Malawi: Blantyre urban profile  Blantyre city is the oldest urban centre in Malawi. It is the hub for communication, commercial activities and cooperation in Malawi. This report consists of: 1. a general background of the urban sector in Blantyre, based on the findings of the Blantyre City Assessment Report, a desk study, interviews, and a city consultation. The background includes data on administration, urban planning, the economy, the informal and private sector, urban poverty, infrastructure, water, sanitation, public transport, street lighting, energy, health, and education; 2. a synthetic assessment of the following eight main thematic areas: governance, local economic development, land, gender, environment, slums and shelter, basic urban services, and waste management in terms of the institutional set-up, regulatory framework, resource mobilization, and performance; 3. a SWOT analysis and an outline of priority project proposals for each theme.
Malawi: Mzuzu urban profile Mzuzu city is one of the fastest growing cities in Malawi and is the third largest urban centre after Lilongwe and Blantyre. It is the hub of government administration, business, industry, commerce, and services for the northern region of Malawi. As previous reports from this series, Mzuzu urban profile presents a general background of the urban sector, a synthetic assessment of eight main thematic areas, a SWOT analysis and an outline of priority project proposals for each theme.
Malawi: Zomba urban profile As previous reports from this series, Zomba urban profile presents a general background of the urban sector, a synthetic assessment of eight main thematic areas, including water and sanitation, a SWOT analysis and an outline of priority project proposals for each theme.
Environment and Security in the Amu Darya Basin  The prime aim of this report is to identify the environmental stress points in the Amu Darya basin which have, or may have, security repercussions for the states and population. The reports takes a close focus on issues of climate change, water, energy and agriculture in the Amu Darya basin, and reveals that it is vital to maintain cooperation in these fields, since neglect for these important areas means intensified security risk. The report then suggests solutions to the challenges identified during the assessment. The assessment report is based on a process comprising missions and consultations with state authorities, representatives of the media and civil society in Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan in 2007-2010.
Evaluating Household Water Treatment Options: Health-based targets and microbiological performance specifications  This document sets forth global criteria to evaluate whether a household water treatment (HWT) option reduces waterborne pathogens sufficiently to protect health. Through use of a risk-based framework and by emphasizing the philosophy of incremental improvement, it is intended to provide implementers and policy-makers with an evidence-based and pragmatic approach to select options suited to local conditions. The document provides a range of technical recommendations, including: a step-by-step overview of how to evaluate HWT microbiological performance; elaboration of health-based water quality targets ranging from interim to highly protective, including establishment of default targets for use in data-scarce settings; description of technology-specific laboratory testing protocols and guiding principles considerations relating to developing national technology evaluation programs. This document is especially intended for resource-scarce settings where water quality laboratories may have limited capacity and incremental improvements of HWT performance could have a substantial, positive impact on public health.
Gender Mainstreaming Impact Study  This impact assessment identifies how the water and sanitation initiatives implemented under the Water Sanitation and Infrastructure Branch of UN-HABITAT, have strategically mainstreamed gender aspects in its various initiatives and to identify achievements and impact, challenges, lessons learned and provide recommendations. The study has looked at global, regional and country activities. The country programmes reviewed are implemented in Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya and Nigeria in Africa; India, LaoPDR, Nepal and Vietnam in Asia and Nicaragua in the Latin America and Caribbean region.
Guidelines for drinking-water quality. 4th edition  This 4th edition of the World Health Organization's Guidelines for Drinking-water Quality builds on over 50 years of guidance by WHO on drinking-water quality, which has formed an authoritative basis for the setting of national regulations and standards for water safety in support of public health. The Guidelines are addressed primarily to water and health regulators, policymakers and their advisors, to assist in the development of national standards. This edition of the Guidelines further develops concepts, approaches and information introduced in previous editions. It considers: drinking-water safety, including minimum procedures and specific guideline values and how these are intended to be used; approaches used in deriving the Guidelines, including guideline values; microbial hazards, which continue to be the primary concern in both developing and developed countries; climate change, which results in changing water temperature and rainfall patterns, severe and prolonged drought or increased flooding, and its implications for water quality and water scarcity, recognizing the importance of managing these impacts as part of water management strategies; chemical contaminants in drinking-water, including information on chemicals not considered previously, such as pesticides used for vector control in drinking water; revisions of existing chemical fact sheets, taking account of new scientific information; those key chemicals responsible for large-scale health effects through drinking water exposure, including arsenic, fluoride, lead, nitrate, selenium and uranium, providing guidance on identifying local priorities and on management; the important roles of many different stakeholders in ensuring drinking-water safety; guidance in situations other than traditional community supplies or managed utilities, such as rainwater harvesting and other non-piped supplies or dual piped systems.
Kenya Country Impact Study  This document is an internal Kenya country impact study of initiatives supported by UN-HABITAT's Water and Sanitation Trust Fund (WSTF). The impact study reviews WSTF's strategic intentions, examines the Kenya country context and UN-HABITAT's country strategy and undertakes an impact study of specific projects. The projects selected for review were two complimentary projects in Kibera focusing on improving water supply and sanitation services to the urban poor including infrastructure investments, strengthening of governance and community management that can be applied to other informal settlements in Kenya; the Kenyan projects of the Regional Lake Victoria Water and Sanitation Initiative, with a specific focus on Homa Bay; the Maji Data Project.
(The) Millennium Development Goals Report 2011  The Millennium Development Goals (MDG) Report, an annual assessment of regional progress towards the Goals, reflects the most comprehensive, up-to-date data compiled by over 25 UN and international agencies. The Report shows that although significant strides have been made, reaching all the MDGs by 2015 remains challenging because progress has failed to reach the most vulnerable. An estimated 1.1 billion people in urban areas and 723 million people in rural areas gained access to an improved drinking water source over the period 1990-2008 but, at the same time, advances in sanitation often bypass the poor and those living in rural areas. More than 2.6 billion people still lack access to toilets or other forms of improved sanitation; and where progress has occurred, it has largely skipped the poor. In Southern Asia, for instance, sanitation coverage for the poorest 40 per cent of households has hardly increased between 1995 and 2008.
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