Water and Development

WASH: water, sanitation and hygiene

Access to safe drinking water and sanitation are recognized in the Millennium Development Goals as key contributors to human health and welfare. Hygienic practices are also crucially important to prevent the spread of diarrheal disease, a major cause of childhood mortality. Appropriate management of excreta protects the environment and can allow for the recovery of nutrients and energy.

News

March 17, 2023

March 17, 2023The UN Water Conference is an urgent appeal to the global community to act on Sustainable Development Goal 6 - Clean Water and Sanitation. Eawag is willing to make its contribution and presents new approaches such as the Urban Water Flow Diagram, which improves water management in cities.

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March 16, 2023

March 16, 2023Black Soldier Flies and the transformation of organic waste into marketable products has been a main research area of the Municipal Solid Waste Management group at Eawag for more than 12 years. Now, the Sustainable Waste-based Insect Farming Technologies project has received funding from the Swiss National Science Foundation and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.

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Scientific publications

Amin, M. B.; Talukdar, P. K.; Asaduzzaman, M.; Roy, S.; Flatgard, B. M.; Islam, M. R.; Saha, S. R.; Mahmud, Z. H.; Navab-Daneshmand, T.; Kile, M. L.; Levy, K.; Julian, T. R.; Islam, M. A. (2022) Effects of chronic exposure to arsenic on the fecal carriage of antibiotic-resistant Escherichia coli among people in rural Bangladesh, PLoS Pathogens, 18(12), e1010952 (23 pp.), doi:10.1371/journal.ppat.1010952, Institutional Repository
Fuhrmann, A.; Wilde, B.; Conz, R. F.; Kantengwa, S.; Konlambigue, M.; Masengesho, B.; Kintche, K.; Kassa, K.; Musazura, W.; Späth, L.; Gold, M.; Mathys, A.; Six, J.; Hartmann, M. (2022) Residues from black soldier fly (Hermetia illucens) larvae rearing influence the plant-associated soil microbiome in the short term, Frontiers in Microbiology, 13, 994091 (19 pp.), doi:10.3389/fmicb.2022.994091, Institutional Repository
Shrestha, A.; Kunwar, B. M.; Meierhofer, R. (2022) Water, sanitation, hygiene practices, health and nutritional status among children before and during the COVID-19 pandemic: longitudinal evidence from remote areas of Dailekh and Achham districts in Nepal, BMC Public Health, 22, 2035 (27 pp.), doi:10.1186/s12889-022-14346-8, Institutional Repository
To the library

Current research projects

Inadequate access to microbiologically safe drinking water continuously threatens the health and well-being of more than a billion people, primarily in developing countries
This project facilitates the exchange of data, maps and information on geogenic contaminants (focussing on arsenic and fluoride) via the web-based Groundwater Assessment Platform (GAP)
The aim of CWIS research is to develop a method that synthesizes existing information about the sanitation landscapes of cities in India and that presents comprehensive sanitation solutions.
With Helvetas-Nepal, this project aims to establish a drinking water security strategy in rural communities
Water Resource Quality (WRQ) was an integrated project running from 2006-2012 at Eawag that aimed to develop a generally applicable framework for the mitigation of geogenic contamination in groundwater used for drinking.

Experts

Dr. Nadja Contzen
  • environmental psychology
  • transdisciplinary research
  • behaviour change
  • health psychology
  • public acceptability
Dr. Lauren Cook
  • planning of infrastructure
  • climate change
  • modeling
  • sustainable water management
  • urban water management
Dr. Fabrizio Fenicia
  • uncertainty assessment
  • catchment hydrology
  • modeling
  • water quality
Dr. Joaquin Jimenez-Martinez
  • groundwater
  • hydrogeology
  • modeling
  • porous and fractured media
  • transport of contaminants
Dr. Joao Paulo Leitao
  • GIS
  • urban planning
  • modeling
  • Risk assessment
  • urban water management
Dr. Christoph Lüthi
  • developing countries
  • urban planning
  • sustainable water management
  • urban sanitation
  • transdisciplinary research
  • drinking water
Dr. Sara Marks
  • sustainable water management
  • technology concepts
  • transdisciplinary research
  • water treatment
  • water supply
Regula Meierhofer
  • urban planning
  • sustainable water management
  • drinking water
  • water treatment
  • water supply
Dr. Daniel Odermatt
  • monitoring
  • surface water
  • spectroscopic methods
  • earth observation
  • remote sensing
Dr. Linda Strande
  • wastewater
  • developing countries
Dr. Christian Zurbrügg
  • solid waste management
  • sustainable water management
  • water treatment
  • urban sanitation
  • water supply

Cover picture: Eawag study in Africa about the recontamination of drinking water in jerrycans. (Photo: Regula Meierhofer)