Facts & Figures

• 90% of urban sewage in the developing world is discharged into rivers, lakes, and coastal waterways without any treatment.

• 95% of all HIV-infected people live in developing countries.

• If present consumption patterns continue, by the year 2025, two out of every three people on earth will live in water-stressed conditions.

• Approximately 790 million people in the developing world are still chronically undernourished, almost two–thirds of whom reside in Asia and the Pacific.

• Globally, 15.7 million adults with AIDS are women and 1.3 million are children below the age of 15.

• Hunger afflicts one out of seven people on Earth.

• Today, about 42 million people in Pakistan lack adequate income to purchase the food they need for a healthy life. The fact that about one-third of the population does not have access to food needed for adequate nutrition is manifested by the widespread incidence of malnutrition. In 1998, the estimated number of malnourished children was about 8 million. Nearly half of the children under five years of age are underweight.

• Every year, an estimated 40 million births go unregistered. That's one third of all babies born in the world.

• Approximately 790 million people in the developing world are still chronically undernourished, almost two-thirds of whom reside in Asia and the Pacific.

• If all countries followed the industrial example, five or six planets would be needed to serve as 'sources' for the inputs and 'sinks' for the waste of economic progress.

• Every year, the US exports about 10 million obsolete computers to Asia to be disposed of as hazardous waste. On average, each computer contains 13 pounds of plastic, 3 pounds of lead, enough cadmium to pollute 260,000 gallons of drinking water, enough chromium to pollute 10,000 gallons, and enough mercury to pollute 260,000 gallons.

• Over 80% of all illness in the developing world is directly or indirectly associated with poor water supply and sanitation. In Ethiopia only 1% of the people have safe water…Annually, one-sixth of all African children die before their first birthday.

• In the past decade alone, the estimated impact of armed conflict on children includes 2 million killed, 6 million seriously injured or permanently disabled, 12 million left homeless, more than 1 million orphaned or separated from their families, and 10 million psychologically traumatized.

• 9 out of 10 fatalities during war are civilians. About half of the victims are children. 8 out of 10 war refugees are women and children

• 1.2 million Iraqi people, including 750,000 children below the age of five, have died due to the scarcity of food and medicine, since the commencement of UN sanctions in 1990.