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Abstract Progress toward achieving Sustainable Development Goal 6, clean water and sanitation for all, is behind schedule and faces substantial financial challenges. Rigorous water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) interventions have underperformed, casting doubt on their efficacy and potentially undermining confidence in WASH funding and investments. But these interventions have leaned on a narrow set of WASH indicators—linear growth and diarrhea—that reflect a 20th‐century prioritization of microbiological water quality as the most important measurement of WASH intervention success. Even when water is microbiologically safe, hundreds of millions of people face harassment, assault, injury, poisoning, anxiety, exhaustion, depression, social exclusion, discrimination, subjugation, hunger, debt, or work, school, or family care absenteeism when retrieving or consuming household water. Measures of WASH intervention success should incorporate these impacts to reinforce the WASH value proposition. We present a way forward for implementing a monitoring and evaluation paradigm shift that can help achieve transformative WASH. This article is categorized under:Engineering Water > Water, Health, and SanitationHuman Water > Value of WaterHuman Water > Methods
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Sustainable lake restoration: From challenges to solutions
Abstract Sustainable management of lakes requires us to overcome ecological, economic, and social challenges. These challenges can be addressed by focusing on achieving ecological improvement within a multifaceted, co‐beneficial context. In‐lake restoration measures may promote more rapid ecosystem responses than is feasible with catchment measures alone, even if multiple interventions are needed. In particular, we identify restoration methods that support the overarching societal target of a circular economy through the use of nutrients, sediments, or biomass that are removed from a lake, in agriculture, as food, or for biogas production. In this emerging field of sustainable restoration techniques, we show examples, discuss benefits and pitfalls, and flag areas for further research and development. Each lake should be assessed individually to ensure that restoration approaches will effectively address lake‐specific problems, do not harm the target lake or downstream ecosystems, are cost‐effective, promote delivery of valuable ecosystem services, minimize conflicts in public interests, and eliminate the necessity for repeated interventions. Achieving optimal, sustainable results from lake restoration relies on multidisciplinary research and close interactions between environmental, social, political, and economic sectors. This article is categorized under:Science of Water > Water QualityWater and Life > Stresses and Pressures on EcosystemsWater and Life > Conservation, Management, and Awareness
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- Award ID(s):
- 2108917
- PAR ID:
- 10467687
- Author(s) / Creator(s):
- ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; more »
- Publisher / Repository:
- Wiley Blackwell (John Wiley & Sons)
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- WIREs Water
- ISSN:
- 2049-1948
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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