(150a) Race To 2015: The Completion Of The Millennium Development Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene Goal

Today, one in every five people do not have access to clean water, especially those in third-world countries. Many rivers and lakes have now been contaminated by effluent factory waste causing them to have poisonous amounts of ammonium, phosphate, and arsenic. This, in addition to natural causes such as droughts, over population, and natural disasters have turned the need for water into a fast-growing problem that could soon turn into a global epidemic if proper precautions are not taken. With the turn of the new millennia in 2000, many of the world’s leading countries knew something had to be done to aid developing nations through these water crises. As a result, in 2005, the United Nations put into play the Millenium Development Goals, with the seventh goal being to reduce the amount of people without access to clean water and proper sanitation by 50% before 2015. A portion of this goal was prematurely achieved in 2010 with 10 million people worldwide gained access to a sustainable water source.
I would like my project this summer to focus on this initiative by focusing on what the American government agencies and non-profit organizations have done thus far to aid the United Nations in completing this goal and conduct further research into what still needs to be implemented to fulfill the objective. Similarly, I would like to look into what other countries and organizations around the world have done to help meet this goal and conclusively postulate as to whether or not the Initiative will be completed in time. Lastly, I would like to focus on what the United States, the rest of the world, and The U.N. should do in the future to make sure that the Water and Santitaion Crisis remains an issue of the upmost importance.