Rural areas must be targeted to exacerbate global clean drinking water crisis: Study

A recent study has revealed the efforts made to provide clean drinking water has been limited to affluent areas, while it is required much more in the rural areas suffering acute shortage of accessible drinking water supply.

Alex Scott, senior editor of Chemical and Engineering News (CandEN) magazine for Europe, has pointed out that most companies involved in water treatment technologies focus on providing services in wealthy industrialized nations.

The study has found out that the critical shortage of clean water is impacting impoverished areas of sub-Saharan Africa, Southeast Asia and other poor regions that can't afford to build or sustain large-scale water purification plants.

Companies that provide water purification technology find it difficult to channel RandD cash toward small-scale, inexpensive water treatment devices that won't recoup their investment.

Nonprofit organizations and chemical companies have developed and started distributing a handful of appropriate technologies, ranging from simple boreholes to straws with built-in filtration systems.

The technology is reaching people in rural villages around the world. Many individuals have benefited from these new technologies, which can be life-saving.