Access to good drinking water fast eluding Ghanaians

Inchaban (W/R), March 22, GNA - Despite the

reasonably sufficient water resources, access to good

drinking water is gradually eluding Ghanaians, Mr Daniel

Muomaala, Western Regional Director of the Aqua-Vitens

Rand Limited, operators of Ghana Water Company, has

stated. He said the resource was increasingly becoming scarce

and of inferior quality largely due to human activities on

water bodies which seriously undermined production as

well as quality. Mr Muomaala who was speaking at the regional

celebration of the World Water Day under the theme:

"Water for Cities - Responding to Urban Challenges,"

mentioned that water pollution was mainly caused by

domestic and industrial waste as well as mining run-offs. He added that one of the biggest challenges of water

pollution in recent times is small-scale mining and called for

a stronger political will to hunt the situation down. He added that such uncontrolled activities along and

within water bodies limited the ability of the appropriate

organisation to harness those water bodies for the use of

urban centres. Mr Joseph Jonah of the Community Water and

Sanitation Agency, noted that water as a finite substance

needed to be well managed in order to avert the shortages

that most parts of the country had had to grapple with. "We seriously need to conserve water, because the

population is ever growing and water bodies also

depleting," he added. Mr Leon Acquaye, Western Regional Manager of the

Public Utilities Regulatory Commission, called for

innovative strategies and monitoring mechanisms to ensure

that people got adequate water supply.