Author(s): Shahbaz Khan
Linked Author(s): Shahbaz Khan
Keywords: 2030 Agenda, SDGs, Asia-Pacific, challenges
Abstract: 2030 Agenda provides both the vision and the commitment to address and resolve the big issues of our time, including: poverty eradication, peace and security, safe and sufficient food, sustainable energy, pollution prevention and control, water and environmental resources management, disease control, mobility, natural and man-induced disasters, population growth, urbanization and sustainable/livable cities. The development of solutions to these key global challenges and the overall transition towards a green economy will need to be based on sound science, technology and innovation. Water plays a key role in almost all the global challenges and therefore water related SDG 6 is an enabling goal for the 2030 Agenda. In Asia and the Pacific region, there are many challenges that modern society is facing in terms of water management. The poorest people, mostly women, are suffering the greatest scarcity and deterioration of water quality. This situation is exacerbated by factors such as climate change, the increasing intensification of farming and agriculture, as well as increasing demand on water as a result of population growth and changing lifestyles. On the other hand, in many instances water management policies and practices have ignored the needs of the people who in a daily routine have to face water scarcity, and therefore must design new adaptive strategies to meet their needs. One of the targets of the MDGs is to halve the proportion of the population without sustainable access to safe drinking water between 2000 and 2015. We are still facing several barriers to reach this objective. One of the handicaps is the dissemination of paradigms and technologies developed under differing socio-cultural setting in developed countries to solve water challenges in the developing countries. As a result, these are not always accepted or fully incorporated, and even sometimes they become a source of conflict or produce negative effects on the target groups and their ecosystems
Year: 2017