Water is a basic human right as recently re-clarified in General Comment 15 of the
Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The importance of water for health
and development has been reflected in international policy initiatives since the
International Decade for Water Supply and Sanitation Development (the 1980s). This was
further emphasised by the Millennium Declaration Goal to halve the proportion of the
World's population that lacks access to water supply and most recently the identification
of water and sanitation as a highest priority issue by the Commission for Sustainable
Development.
Since the 1960s, WHO has periodically reported on the development of the access to safe
drinking-water sources; this is now implemented as a joint programme of work with
UNICEF through the WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP) for Water
Supply and Sanitation.
In recent reviews and evaluations the need for JMP to progressively address new and
emerging priorities has been highlighted. As part of the ongoing plan of work of JMP, a
major initiative to more comprehensively take account of water quality issues has been
initiated.
This handbook has been developed as a resource to support the systematic evaluation of
drinking-water quality status at country and local levels. It is hoped that it will be useful
to those interested in describing and understanding drinking-water quality status in the
context of JMP at national/state levels and on a project basis
