SITUATION ANALYSIS
During 2016 water continued to be used as a weapon of war. On approximately 30 different occasions, water infrastructure and water supply were directly attacked or deliberately turned off as a tactic of war. Major cities like Aleppo and Damascus suffered water shortages due to those tactics in addition to lack of maintenance and damage to the water systems. Limitations in the water network supply have resulted in almost 50 per cent of the population meeting the majority of their water needs from alternative sources, including costly commercial water trucking and unsafe open wells.
HIGHLIGHTS
• Through investments in clean water, hygiene and sanitation, including infrastructure, UNICEF contributed to there being no major disease outbreaks in 2016.
• UNICEF’s provision of over 6,437 metric tons of water disinfectant supported over 14 million people to have access to clean water every month.
• UNICEF’s humanitarian WASH efforts reached over 1.7 million people, including through trucking of nearly 1.5 billion litres of water and through the provision over 5 million litres of fuel for generators to run water pumping stations.