Proposal for Change: Dominican Republic
Introduction
The Dominican Republic lies within the borders of both the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. It shares within it a continuous structure of struggle to try and modernize it due to its political past (Hirji, & Davis, 2009). The sufficiency of sanitation and water in the country is a global problem because this country is faced by poor living conditions that are a threat to the general health of the population at large who live there and as well those who stop there for vacations. The country has a well endowment of vacation facilities thus opens up a global threat in terms of the health infrastructure.
The Dominican Republic demonstrates this health problem with the challenges that face it towards the provision of clean water for consumption and the further access to the services of proper sanitation. This is because the Dominican Republic has got an array of a multitude of geographical fragmentations within which a structure of a high statistical value of the tourism industry occurs (Campos-Outcalt, 2000). This is because most of the income for the country is highly dependent on the tourism industry of which it receives a tenable amount of visitors within.
The provision of a well streamlined phase of clean water and a high value of sanitation may help highly with the problem that is globally underlying concerning the value of sanitation. The provision of proper levels of sanitation especially in the tourist dominated areas is arguably the right solution to this global problem.
Body
The plight of tourism in the Dominican Republic has constantly been a major concern of the residents owing to the fact that the accessibility of the water is a factor that has constantly married the availability of the water. Usually the Geographic location of the people is the major barrier that has dictated the availability of the safe drinking water in the society of the Dominican Republic.
According to the statistical values offered, by the world health organization, the Dominican Republic holds a total population of about more than eight million whereby about 60% of the individuals, live in the urban areas (World water assessment programme united nations,2003). Those who live in the urban areas are constantly supplied with water of up to about 97% coverage as compared to the 92% coverage in the rural, areas of the country.
The households that tend to be poor have a limited amount of water coverage with a reference to only about 56% of the households that are poor being covered with a constant supply of water. This, problem is more adverse since the coverage of proper disposal factors is also limited by the class of people in the society. The poor people have got a limited access to the daily, proper drainage systems and sewers. According to statistics only 20% of the households that are poor have got a proper access to the sewers, system. This ,as compared to the coverage of the sewer system of the non poor is like half of the coverage since the rich ,are ,covered by the sewer system of up to ,50%.further the water shortage is acutely observed due to the underlying factors of the excess consumption that is in the urban areas ,since most of the people mare settled in these areas (Dinar,2008).
The poor management of the water system creates a void within which each of the residents in the area is tenable to receiving g the water supply. The constant discontinuation of the water, supply, conversely affects the realm of the water supply thus garnering a defect of the quality of service offered in the country. For instance only 10.5% of the total population in the area is served constantly to the water basis .without discontinuation at one point or another. It is also worth noting that the factors surrounding the quality of water are also adverse.
In this country the purification of water is a constricting factor towards the general sanitation of the populace at large. The purification processes of the country are wanting drawing in to the fact that the water treatment plants that are available within the country are usually not well maintained and in fact are not well taken care of. According to statistics, only 38.4% of the water systems are constantly taken care of, according to treatment of the water (Jermyn &Foley, 2005). These systems are the only ones that receive water that is chlorinated thus safe for, human, consumption. , these areas are those that are far from the urban areas and are secluded to the exotic, areas of the rural divides. In fact the aspect of chlorination usually does not directly mean that the water being taken has been fully certified for consumption.
According to a study done in the year 2002, statistics has it that only, 73.6%, of the water that is available for drinking is fully certified to be a truly safe. This ,study carried ,out ,tested the presence of coli forms in the water that render the water unsafe due to the presence of the pathogens that create a lethal hazard to the general population. The standards that are kept, however by the country are usually a certification of about 95% certification of which few of the system avail this measure. The water that is found on the ground is also somewhat depleted especially in the urban areas whereby the waste system is compromised into the system of water supply thus causing a problem of sanitation that is almost irreversible to the population that both visits the country as well as the tourists. In addition the water problem in the country continues to be a global concern since the water structure in terms of management tends to have many stakeholders all of who act differently into the plight of the water supply and sanitation.
The system is divided into The Secretariado Técnico de la Presidencia that is usually the department that is tenable to looking into the issues of the coming up of the current policies that concern the water system at large (Englar,2004). The secretariat of public health looks at the issues of the quality system of the water for consumption while the role of the maintenance of the environment at large is taken up by the secretariat of the environment and the natural resources. The department of the norms and systems quality dictates the norms of quality in the sector. This fragmentation of the department of the sanitation and water supply does not conclusively maintain the department of water since there is a void created by the various departments thus creating an instance of the lack, of proper direction in the sector. This also involves the involvement of the nongovernmental organizations and the private sector in the involvement of the treatment of water and the provision of the sewer systems to the individuals.
The taking care of the sanitation and water projects is wholly not left to the government of Dominican republic rather to the private sectors who sometime act partially towards the conclusive approach of the plight of water in the country (Biswas,2006).
The tourism sector also tends to use more water than is actually of other countries. For instance as compared to the Caribbean neighboring countries, the tourism industry of the Dominican republic uses a volume of up to 280% more water than they use in the hotels( Robles, 2007). This consumption conversely constricts the amount of water supplied to the rest of the country.
Solutions
The fact that this problem of water revolves around an array of a multidimensional of activities shouts aloud around a number of solutions. The paramount solution however revolves around the constant streamline of the sector that deals with the water supply. This involves the gathering of all the forces that are within the enhancement of the water industry and putting together strategies with which to work along in the sector. The departments that are involved in the establishment of policies that culminate in the supply of water as well as its quality and the environment should be merged to enhance their impact in the country (Acevedo, 2011). Instead, of these sectors acting as separate entities, they should be merged to form a well structured stack of structure that ensures that all aspects of the water problems are tackled.
Further in order to ensure that the nongovernmental organizations hold a stake in the plight of proper structures of water system, man effort to vet their particulate efforts should be done to term the standards of the services that they offer. The application of standard within which the private sector and the nongovernmental organizations should work upon should be provided to initiate a system that is future oriented and is not biased in some areas. Incentives by the government by the decentralization of resources in all the parts of the country should be geared towards in order to re-gather the population to the unsettled areas.
This tries to deviate the limitation of the water supply to certain parts of the country. Alleviation of the water supply system from the high limits in the urban areas than the rural areas should be looked into to create equilibrium min the water supply and sewer systems (Campos-Outcalt, 2000). All this systems, revolve around the enhancement of the water supply and environment sector in the .conceptualizing of the global need and heeding to it closely with the stakeholders in the country who arte the government, private sector and the nongovernmental organizations.
However the effectiveness of these solutions maybe constricted to the manner of policies set by the stakeholders in the country. This could term to look into conflicting views and ideas on how to tackle the problem thus may limit solving. Further the tourism sector tends to take a high toll of the water supply and thus in a plight to maximize the revenue in the country may tend to constrict the supply of water to the residents channeling it to the tourists stops to earn, revenue (Acevedo, 2011).
Further, the fact that the Dominican Republic is imbalanced in the form of industrialization creates a block within which the migration of people from the rural areas is constant. Decentralization of enhanced water, systems in the sector can therefore, be hard to achieve since the population is somewhat high in some sectors while in others it is limited. This creates a difficulty in the manner in which to balance the supply in the country.
The solution of the enhancement however goes around these barriers since the system will be freshly redone to comprehensively draw in to the society in a manner to create incentives. For instance the problem of the chlorination of water for safety by the various sectors will be restricted to the non-governmental organizations that are fully vetted thus genuine service provision despite the limitation of the population stratification (Campos-Outcalt, 2000). Further the barrier of various policies made will be gone around by the documentation of restrictive strategies by the enhanced and united water sector in the country. Thus all the sectors that play roles of the water enhancement in the country will comprehensively be restricted to a certain manner within which they act and not anything less than the stipulated rules.
The channeling of more water supplies, to the tourism sector will not be a problem since the people will, not have a limited supply since the resources of the water will be fully fledged in all the areas in the country (Harberle, 2003). This is because the people will not be forced to move from the rural areas towards the urban areas in search of industrialization since the rural areas will have a good supply of water that ensures the establishment of industries in the rural areas. This will create a balance between the barriers and the solutions in order to ensure a system that is more futuristic and eliminates the value of the water system yet contributes highly to the multidimensional needs of the country.
Conclusion
The continuous struggle towards the achievement of a fully modernized nation is a vision that is achievable in a span of a short time. However the amount of effort to be included in the atmosphere of the achievement of a state of security of the water for consumption and the sanitation issue is quite large. Achieving a 99% degree of access of clean water is an achievable feature that requires the efforts of the sectors in the country to, work together in the achievement of modernity of good health. The story of health is crucial and requires a highly fully fledged attention within which every strategy includes a step towards the achievement of the goal of health sanity.
This is a process that the republic needs to take up in order to alleviate the situation before it gets out of hand in the country. The emphasis should not only be left to the plight of the tourists but also to the safety of the residents of the Dominican Republic (Harberle, 2003). Therefore the clarity of understanding fully the problem shall enhance the current global concern making sure it becomes a thing of the past with time. The enhancement of the water supply will thus act as a stepping stone within which modernity in the nation will be taken up. This will be due to the elimination of centralization and moving to a norm of decentralization.
References
Acevedo, L. (2011, May 16). Childhood Malnutrition. Retrieved June 25, 2011, from Dominican Republic – Unicef: http://www.unicef.org/republicadominicana/english/survival_development_12567 .htm
Biswas, K.A. (2006).Water quality management in the Americas.USA: Birkhauser publishing company.
Campos-Outcalt, D. (2000).20 common problems in preventive health care.USA: McGraw hill professional publishers.
Dinar, S. (2008).International water treaties: negotiation and cooperation along transboundary rivers.USA: Routledge publishers.
Englar, M. (2004).Dominican Republic.USA: Capstone press.
Harberle, E.S. (2003).Dominican republic.USA: Capstone press.
Hirji, R & Davis, R. (2009).Environmentall flows in water resources policies, plans, and projects: findings and recommendations.USA: World Bank publications.
Jermyn, L &Foley, E. (2005).Dominican republic.USA: Marshall Cavendish publishers.
Robles, F. (2007). Pollution Sickens Children in Dominican Republic.The Miami Herald , 2.
World water assessment programme United Nations. (2003).water for people, water for life: a joint report by the twenty-three UN agencies concerned with freshwater.USA: Berghahn publishing books.
