Citizen and Educational Initiatives to Support Sustainable Development Goal 6: Clean Water and Sanitation for All

Does Public Awareness Matter to Achieve the UN's Sustainable Development Goal 6: Clean Water for Everyone?

United Nations set a Sustainable Development Goal to provide clean water for everyone (SDG 6). The successful implementation of SDG 6 is still miles to go. Public awareness's role as a key factor in achieving Sustainable Development Goal 6 is vital but received less attention from researchers in the past. To understand the role of public awareness and other relevant factors in achieving SDG 6, we have collected a cross-sectional dataset from a developing country and applied a partial least square structural equation modelling approach. The results revealed that willingness to pay for clean water, social influence, and facilities provided by the government, public awareness, and knowledge about contaminated water positively influence the households' intentions to use clean water. We also found that public awareness partially mediates relationships. Study results have useful policy implications for governments, NGOs, and other stakeholder organizations working on achieving SDG 6 in developing countries.

Education on Sustainable Development Goals: Geographical Perspectives for Gender Equality in Sustainable Cities and Communities

Because of its interdisciplinary approach as a social science directly related to the natural sciences, geography is the academic discipline and school subject that equips students well with knowledge, skills, and values related to education on sustainable development goals. This study is part of the results of MyGEO, a project funded by the European Commission, and it is based on a collaborative mapping of streets named after women in a medium-sized city (Zaragoza, Spain), in connection with the international initiative GeoChicas (GeoGirls) on OpenStreetMap. Its main objective is to obtain evidence to emphasize, through public and digital space, gender equality and the empowerment of women in teacher education by means of their achievements. The learning methodology consists of (i) standardization and correction of alphanumeric information referring to street names contained in the OpenStreetMap spatial database that identify gender and (ii) linking and creating thematic information through Wikipedia editing. The results show that Zaragoza is at the top of the ranking of Spanish and Latin American cities mapped to date in the “Women’s Streets” viewer, with 18% of the streets named after women, compared to the average 15% in the rest of the 30 cities involved in GeoChicas. The direct participation of trainee primary and secondary schoolteachers in this project makes it possible to consolidate a narrative as well as a specific instructional design on education for sustainable development, particularly on SDG number 5 (gender balance) and SDG number 11 (sustainable cities and communities).

Achieving Sustainable Development Goals. Efficiency in the Spanish Clean Water and Sanitation Sector

In recent years, achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is becoming a major challenge for local governments. This research focuses on the role of Spanish local governments in the fulfillment of SDG-6, which aims to ensure the availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all citizens. Specifically, this study analyses the evolution of the efficiency of Spanish local governments, and its determining factors, in the achievement of the SDG-6. The results indicate that the taxes associated with water supply and sanitation services, the private management of these services, population density, local government budget revenues, the income of the inhabitants of the municipality and the fragmentation of local governments are factors that can improve the evolution of the efficiency of Spanish local governments in achieving the SDG-6.