Access to safe drinking water and sanitation was recognised as a human right in 2010 by the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA); in 2015 it specified a distinction between the human right to safe drinking water and the human right to sanitation.

This distinction serves to recognise the importance of services providing drinking water supply, sanitation and wastewater management, as these services are instruments that are integral to the progressive realisation of these rights, with a focus on reducing the existing equality gaps.

Water and sanitation actors across the globe must ensure that drinking water and sanitation are available and sustainably managed, and that nobody is left out. Water and sanitation practitioners must ensure that they are aware that the scope of SDG6 covers the entire water cycle, including the integrated management of source water, the need to pursue water efficiency and the protection of ecosystem integrity to guarantee their essential products and services.

A group of experts, including David Alves of ERSAR, from across the sector undertook to develop the Manual on the Human Rights to Drinking Water and Sanitation for Practitioners, which was published by the International Water Association in October 2016.

The Manual on Human Rights for Drinking Water and Sanitation for Practitioners focuses on the role of water services providers and regulators. The human rights-based approach to water and sanitation introduces a set of principles and criteria, some of which may traditionally not be at the centre of providers and regulator’s concerns, but which must be respected and adhered to. The criteria are accessibility, availability, water quality and safety, affordability and acceptability.

The success of the progressive realisation of rights derives mostly from their integration into the management instruments of the operators, such as in operational plans that provide service levels compatible with these principles, criteria and objectives.

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