Working together to end poverty and injustice

Killer facts on water

• One billion people in our world live without safe drinking water.
• Today, 2.5 billion people, including almost one billion children, live without basic sanitation.
• Diarrhoea kills more children every year than AIDS, malaria and measles combined.
• Dirty water is killing more people than wars and other violence.
• There are over one million children dying every year from dirty water and poor sanitation.
• When combined, safe water, sanitation and hygiene reduce the number of deaths caused by diarrhoea by 65 percent.
• The minimum estimated amount of safe water every individual needs is 20 to 50 litres every day.
• The average person in the developing world uses 10 litres of water every day for their drinking, washing and cooking. This is the same amount used in the average flush of a New Zealand toilet.
• New Zealanders each use between 160-400 litres per day.
• The weight of water that women in Africa and Asia carry on their heads is commonly 20kg, the same as the average NZ airport luggage allowance.
• 40 billion working hours are spent carrying water each year in Africa.
• 443 million school days are lost due to water related diseases.
• 11 percent more girls attend school when sanitation is available.
• Oxfam projects providing safe water, sanitation and hygiene education cost on average just $45 per head.

Your support can go a long way

• $10 can provide 40kg of cement for the foundations of a water tank.
• $30 can provide 6 metres of pipe for a gravity-fed water system.
• $100 can provide a community with a tap stand.
• $1500 can provide a 9000 litre water tank.
  

• Donate to Oxfam's Water for Survival programme
• Find out more about our Safe Water appeal

*Facts are taken from the following sources: United Kingdom Department For International Development, United Nations Children Fund, United Nations Human Development Report, Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council, World Health Organization, World Water Assessment Programme.