A girl shows her clean hands in a toilet installation
Sonia (4) shows her clean hands after using the toilet and washing them. The young girl lives in Rehun Village, India.
Photo:Vinay Panjwani/UNICEF

Accelerating Change

The hummingbird is the symbol of World Toilet Day and World Water Day 2023

In the ancient story, a hummingbird does what she can to fight a great fire – carrying droplets of water in her beak. Her actions – even though small – are helping solve a big problem.

This year’s theme is ‘Accelerating Change’, using the hummingbird to inspire people to take personal action to help improve toilets and sanitation systems.

Right now, we are seriously off track to meet Sustainable Development Goal 6: safe toilets and water for all by 2030.

Governments and institutions must be accountable for delivering on their promises. And every one of us must do what we can to help speed up progress.

 

A toilet is small but mighty – just like a hummingbird!

Toilets are a foundation stone of public health and play a critical role in protecting the environment.

To leave so many people behind without safe toilets puts in jeopardy the entire 2030 Agenda, with the poorest people, particularly women and girls, paying the highest price in terms of poor health, missed education, loss of productivity and general insecurity.

The World Toilet Day 2023 campaign asks people to ‘be like a hummingbird’ – to take simple actions to help accelerate change. What can you do?

A drawing of a hummingbird

Be like a hummingbird this World Toilet Day!

Visit the World Toilet Day website to choose what action to take. Use our activation kit to spread the word, make an origami hummingbird nest as part of a global art movement, or take simple sanitation actions, such as flushing your toilet less, fixing leaky pipes, contacting politicians, and busting taboos.

Key messages you should know on World Toilet Day 2023

  1. With just seven years left, the world has to work, on average, five times faster to meet the sanitation target of SDG 6 – safe toilets and water for all by 2030 – on time.
  2. Sanitation and drinking water are human rights, and access to these services is critical to people’s health and the integrity of the environment.
  3. Over 7,000 people have already committed to take water and sanitation-related actions to help accelerate change towards SDG 6.

Did you know?

  • There are 3.5 billion people living without safe toilets and 2.2 billion persons living without safe drinking water.
  • 419 million people still go to the toilet in the open (‘open defecation’).
  • 2 billion people - a quarter of the world's population - lack basic handwashing facilities at home to wash their hands with soap and water.
  • Unsafe water, sanitation, and hygiene are responsible for the deaths of around 1,000 children under five every day. (UNICEF 2023)
  • At the current rate, 3 billion people will still be living without safe toilets, 2 billion will be without safe drinking water and 1.4 billion will lack basic hygiene facilities by 2030.

Source: WHO/UNICEF 2023

Family portrait next to the word stories leading to a page with stories about toilets and sanitation

Spread the word!

Spread the message with the resources you will find on the the UN Water Trello board. You can also  download all the material created in english

Drawing of a hummingbird next to the message Be the change. Use your voice
A young boy about to use a sanitary latrine

There is no single UN entity dedicated exclusively to water issues. Over 30 UN organizations carry out water and sanitation programs, reflecting the fact that water issues run through all of the UN’s main focus areas. UN-Water’s role is to coordinate them all so that the UN family ‘delivers as one’ in response to water-related challenges. 

A woman goes out of a letrine from UNICEF and 2 kids are cleaning their hands in a sanitation system

The world is seriously off track to meet internationally agreed water-related goals and targets, including Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 “to ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all by 2030”. UN-Water’s Blueprint for Acceleration: SDG 6 Synthesis Report on Water and Sanitation 2023 is a concise guide to rapidly delivering concrete results.
 

an abstract illustration of people engaged in an event

International days and weeks are occasions to educate the public on issues of concern, to mobilize political will and resources to address global problems, and to celebrate and reinforce achievements of humanity. The existence of international days predates the establishment of the United Nations, but the UN has embraced them as a powerful advocacy tool. We also mark other UN observances.