World Toilet Conference

The seventh World Toilet Conference got over in Delhi on November 2. The theme of the four-day summit was 'Toilet for all'.

More than 400 delegates from 42 countries participated in the conference and deliberated ways to provide basic sanitation facilities to achieve the un' s millennium development goals. "The task is huge, as half of the world's population lacks access to a hygienic toilet. Global coverage needs to grow to 75 per cent by 2015 to achieve the goal," said Jack Sim of the World Toilet Organization, an international ngo and co-organizer of the summit.

The conference had particular relevance for India, where only 34 per cent people have access to toilet. Speaking at the conference, Rural Development Minister Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, however, asserted that India will achieve the millenium development goal much before 2015.

About 48 per cent of Indian villages have already been covered under the government's Total Sanitation Campaign, the minister said.