Water scarcity is a massive issue worldwide, afflicting billions of people. The true crime, however, lies in not just the number of people affected, but who specifically remains most disadvantaged. Worldwide, there is a clear discrepancy between developed and developing countries in terms of consistent, reliable access to clean water. In fact, the latter often fluctuates between the two states of dried-out reservoirs and overflowing freshwater bodies that collect pollution and other harmful contaminants. Since water scarcity is a relative measure, the issue in developing nations is further compounded by rapidly growing populations superseding existing water infrastructure. Among such communities, water shortages also often further reinforce social hierarchies, as women are relegated to the task of spending hours a day collecting nearby freshwater, harming both women and the overall economy by causing them to forgo the opportunity to pursue education or other more productive tasks. Hence, the provision of clean water in regions like sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia must be brought about by both local initiatives that empower women and local communities against water scarcity and top-down initiatives that establish a more integrated water management system that will not only provide clean water to all communities by helping to redistribute water even to communities otherwise isolated from nearby freshwater sources, but also by containing waste to prevent its runoff into local water supplies, improving both human and agricultural health that relies on these sources.
Nevertheless, even in rich countries with seemingly adequate water infrastructure like the United States, there are still large sections of the population that suffer from consuming and bathing in less-than-ideal water. Even in recent years, cases like what occurred in Flint, Michigan still pop up from time to time despite ever-more-stringent regulation, as there are many communities that still fall through the cracks due to disregard. The first issue might be that such people are simply not factored in when data collection occurs, as many who live in homeless-designated housing or substandard homes where usual upkeep regarding maintenance is harder. Another potential problem is rising water bills, pricing out low-income communities from safe water sources. These divides then follow clear racial lines, as African American and Latino households are twice as likely to lack indoor plumbing and wastewater services as white households, and Native Americans were 19-fold more likely. It is also worth noting the role of economic productivity, because since low-income majority-minority regions contribute the least taxpayer revenue, they are also often considered the most dispensable to heavy industrial activities like mining, waste storage, and metal refining, all of which leave unhealthily high levels of pollutants for the local residents and then contaminate the local water.
Solutions are obviously needed given the situation's direness, and the economic reasoning needed to make a change is there. For every dollar invested in water infrastructure in each household, five dollars are contributed to the local economy through better health and more ease with water usage for otherwise time-consuming daily tasks. The situation, once again, is multifaceted, as grassroots campaigns must be started to engage low-income communities in more political advocacy to push their local jurisdictions toward establishing better water policies in their regions, as such areas were often neglected due to being in historically redlined and discriminated areas and still today because of their low tax contribution to city services. At the top, better water management also needs to occur given the inequalities within even a single metropolitan area, creating better standards through more complete surveys of the residents and neighborhoods within a region and, then, instilling frequent check-ups to ensure a high level of upkeep.
Overall, when it comes to the availability of water, there is still a high degree of environmental racism present when it comes to which communities and demographics have the least protected water. In the United States, these include inner-city Black and Latino communities, while internationally, they include mainly those in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. More equitable policy and water management is needed to solve the environmental racism crisis, ensuring that resources are distributed more equitably along with the pursuit of sustainable economic development, especially in the developing world, that maintains a healthy environment as opposed to just limitlessly expanding industry that pollutes the local environment.