Summary: WaterAid's new report, reveals that a standard water bill in developed countries is as little as 0.1% of the income of someone earning the minimum wage, while, in a country like Madagascar, however, a person reliant on a tanker truck for their water supply would spend as much as 45% of their daily income on water to get just the recommended daily minimum supply. In Mozambique, families relying on black-market vendors will spend up to 100 times as much on water as those reached by government-subsidized water points.

Topping the list of 10 worst countries for household access to clean water is the Pacific island nation of Papua New Guinea—poor, rural, and faced with rising seas and extreme weather from climate change. Poor families living in Papua New Guinea have no choice but to spend more than half their meager income on this basic essential.

photo credit: WaterAid/Andrew McConnell