A $10 million project funded by the European Community to improve Iraq’s water and sanitation services is underway. Implemented by UNICEF in collaboration with the Ministry of Municipalities and Public Works and the Ministry of Municipalities in Kurdistan, the project will increase the government’s provision of services as well as strengthen their capacity to manage and develop Iraq’s water and sanitation sector.

For more information, please visit: www.unicef.org/media/media_50106.html

The American Water Works Association (AWWA) today announced that Macon Water Authority won its annual “Best of the Best” Water Taste Test. The event, comprised of North American winners of regional water-tasting competitions, was held at the AWWA’s Annual Conference and Exposition (ACE09) in San Diego.

For more information, please visit: www.drinktap.org/mediadnn/Portals/6/PressReleases/06_15_09_Taste%20Test%20Winner.pdf

Justice (Retd.) Shravan Shankar Jha's two day visit on the 4th and 5th of June to the Sardar Sarovar affected areas in Badwani and Dhar districts brought out the massive scale of corruption which has seeped into each of the rehabilitation related work and infested the same. Justice Jha Commission appointed by the High Court of Madhya Pradesh by its order dated 21-08-2008 in the case of Narmada Bachao Andolan versus Government of Madhya Pradesh, Narmada Valley Development Authority, Narmada Control Authority and others has now taken up the work of in-depth inquiry in a full-fledged manner receiving complaints and now paying field visits.

For more information, please visit: www.narmada.org/nba-press-releases/june-2009/09June.html

One of the most hotly debated mega projects in post-independent India, Sardar Sarovar Project is increasingly in the news these days not just for the massive reservoir-induced displacement in the face of poor compliance on rehabilitation and environmental fronts and rampant corruption, but more so for the all too frequent canal breaches that are being caused in the 'command area' or 'beneficiary area' of the Project in Gujarat, thereby severely affecting the farmers and leading to exploitation of those dependent on the Narmada waters.

For more information, please visit: www.narmada.org/nba-press-releases/june-2009/08June.html

Announce completion of Rain Water Harvesting (RWH) project at SOS Children's Village, Sector 29 Faridabad and launch a new RWH project in at SOS Children's Village, Greenfields, Faridabad on World Environment Day; The RWH projects at Faridabad have a combined potential to harvest 14792 kilolitres of rainwater; These projects are an important step towards ensuring sustainable water resources for children as envisaged in the nationwide water conservation partnership announced earlier this year; Nationwide partnership entails construction of RWH projects at 39 SOS locations spread across the country for a total project outlay of USD 585,000 (Rs. 28,080,000)

For more information, please visit: www.indiaprwire.com/pressrelease/environmental-services/2009060626925.htm

What ‘Water Initiatives Orissa (WIO)’ had found out three years ago have been substantiated now by a World Bank report, titled ‘Climate Change Impacts in Drought and Flood Affected Areas: Case Studies in India’. The World Bank report – which took Orissa as a case study of flooding in a climate change scenarios - has referred to projections that ‘temperatures, precipitation, and flooding are likely to increase, with adverse impacts on crop yields and farm incomes. Among the more substantial effects is a spatial shift in the pattern of rainfall towards the already flood-prone coastal areas’. Three years ago the WIO had found out significant increase in average annual rainfall in coastal districts like Baleswar and Puri. Now the World Bank report has projected 23 per cent increase in annual mean rainfall in that region.

For more information, please visit: www.indiawaterportal.org/blog/2009/06/04/press-release-water-initiatives-orissa/