Sanitation in Nicaragua

it is much improved.

In order to facilitate the flow of the discussion I have taken the liberty of posting a copy of Peter's comment here.

His comment can be read below my answer.

Nicaragua is famous for having virtually uncontrolled garbage dumps. Thank goodness this situation is slowly changing. Unscrupulous politicians and indiscriminate dumping of garbage has certainly taken its toll on the environment of Nicaragua.

At the same token, Nicaragua is hardly alone with this problem. When I read Peter's comment that Costa Rica is far advanced in sanitation and water quality I decided to see what I can find out and try to verify or disprove his statement.

Here is an article I found on the internet: http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0417/p13s02-sten.html

I am quoting here from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Managua

Urban planning

The German government is currently funding the construction of a water treatment plant with plans to process the city's sewage and clean the Managua lake. When finished, it will be the largest water treatment plant in Central America.[7] Also pending is a mega-project to reconstruct the old center of Managua, and to introduce a monorail system, to alleviate future transportation problems in Managua.[50] Both of these projects will revitalize the old center of Managua and boost tourism, commerce, infrastructure and economic development.

To be fair to Peter, I have not spent a lot of time on researching this subject and a lot of the articles need to be paid for in order to view them.

In my opinion, in this respect, there are precious few differences between the two countries.

The hygienic habits of Ticas and Nicas are just too similar. Their culture and history are intertwined. The Americanization of Costa Rica has done little to change that.

FYL mentioned an article. I searched for it but simply ran out of time.

Based on the little info I dug up I just can't see any systemic attempt to misinform the readers on this subject.

Maybe Peter can provide some more documentation on the subject of water quality and sanitation differences between the two countries.

Peter's post below

This thread reminds me of the Masaya Dump. I interviewed an NGO worker in Masaya who was working with the dump and the city composting program (in other words he Was the city composting program). This was about four years ago. He took me on a tour of the dump. The entire entrance road into the dump was piled up with garbage. What had happened? A prominent local politician had borrowed the bulldozer, and rented it out to put some extra cash in his own pocket (nothing unusual). Hence, the garbage trucks just had to dump their refuse further and further away from the actual landfill. Dengue rates got higher and higher. Bummer for those poor souls who lived near the dump and market.

Fyl's comment ("Marketing:. That's the difference between Nicaragua and Costa Rica...") is a typical example of the systematic misinformation that he posts on the nicaliving.com website that he owns (and that he posts on other websites). A basic library-literate junior high school student can check a variety of online sources and quickly recognize that Costa Rica has better drinking water quality, fecal treatment, and waste (garbage) management. Any person who has visited the two countries can see the same thing with his own eyes. If he chooses to drink the water in both countries, he quickly learns that the Costa Rican water doesn't give him quite the same "cleansing." (You rarely get the runs or dysentery drinking Costa Rican tap water, spring water, or even mountain stream water, but you often do in Nicaragua from any of those sources.)

Of course, this doesn't mean that Nicaragua is a worse place to live. There are some charms about living in Nicaragua. But the Nicaraguan experience will be more fully appreciated by arrivals having expectations properly in line with reality.

Peter Christopher

It may be that the things compared are not all that comparable. I too have seen the 35% and 5% figures, but the 35% is usually listed as what percentage of "waste water" Nicaragua treats, whereas the 5% is stated as the portion of "sewage waste" Costa Rica treats. The reader is left wondering if the exact same wastes are really being compared. Costa Rica made great strides in the last decade, especially the last few years via via monies from JBIC (Japanese Bank for International Development. Rural Costa Rica has especially good rural numbers, with 97% of people having some form of service or system - though mostly septic tank models, and it isn't clear if that counts as "treatment" under some statistical gathering. The largest projects are tracked and often funded by WHO/UNICEF and related agencies, and they have up-to-date reports (see below, though these are just two reports and there is more recent, less specific water-related information). The difference between Nicaragua and Costa Rica isn't simply one of sometimes questionable public relations or advertising - though Costa Rica does a lot of this, and has for 20+ years.

http://www.wssinfo.org/pdf/country/CRI_san.pdf

http://www.wssinfo.org/pdf/country/NIC_san.pdf