48 pc have access to improved sanitation in Asia

"We should take united efforts to ensure sanitation for all Asian people as Bangladesh sets it targets to ensure sanitation for its people by the year 2010," said the minister at Bangladesh-China Friendship conference centre.

More than 200 delegates including ministers, high officials, civil society representatives, professionals and experts, journalists from nine countries attended the sanitation conference.

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Referring to a recent survey conducted by LGRD, Bhuiyan said that only 33 percent people in Bangladesh, excluding Dhaka city, live within sanitary network.

Bhuyina said the sanitation problems faced by the millions of people in this region are also common in nature so this conference will open the door for mutual cooperation among the countries in the field of sanitation.

Referring to the worse sanitary situation in the densely populated Bangladesh, Minister for forest and environment Shajahan Siraj said 110 thousand children below the age of five years die of diarrhoea every year because of inadequate sanitation.

Emphasising a comprehensive plan to combat this deadly menace, he said now the assembly opened an avenue for all to regularly ventilate ideas, to share experiences in order to develop common policy and strategies for sanitation.

Taking part in the inaugural session, Indian union minister of Rural Development Kashi Ram Rana said his government took necessary steps to ensure sanitation for all by the year 2010.

"We feel that we should not wait till 2015, so our government have resolved to sanction the Total Sanitation Campaign projects to all the districts by the end of the year 2006 which is likely to be implemented by the year 2015," Kashi Ram said.

Among others, Umesh Pande of Nepal, Vanessa Tobin of UNICEF, Dr Sangay Thinley of Bhutan, Aminath Rasheeda of Maldives, Dr Waan Manng of Myanmer, Baddimah Tamang of Nepal, Wakil Khan Afridi of Pakistan and W Piyasena of Sri Lanka spoke at the inaugural session.

Delegates from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka's representatives will be presenting the sanitation situation in their respective countries in the three-day conference.