Study on drinking water consumption behavior of people away from residents

Abstract

Now a day’s safety & quality of drinking water is an important public health concern. Working People spend substantial amount of time outside their residence, it is likely to be the norm rather than an exception. These floating people usually face some difficulty in choosing water source for drinking purpose. Previously some study has been conducted on the water supply availability & consumption behavior of a particular area and people. But as a majority of the population spends a significant amount of time outside home, our purpose is to find out the water consumption behavior of floating people, which is quite rare in the context of Bangladesh. Depend on educational background & economic condition people chose different type of source for drinking water for consumption. At present, there is inadequate information on quality of the water sources the drink water from and it is important that the consumers can be assured of their quality and safety. In Bangladesh and most of the bottled drinking water in the market does not conform to the international safe drinking water protocol. From the study we found that the source of water bottled for marketing was mostly ground water while some of the brands had used water supplied by the Dhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Authority (WASA). These large closed containers are directly attached to dispensing mechanics & after dispensation the water is provided to the consumers in small glass. Clean and healthy drinking water is important for life. Access to safe drinking water has been an important national goal in Bangladesh and in other developing countries. Water plays a major role in overall disease profile of Bangladesh. Diarrhea & gastro intestinal disease account for nearly a quarter of all illness in Bangladesh- about 12% by diarrhea and 10% by gastro-intestinal diseases (ICDDRB). So in order to find the necessary information that affects their drinking water choice we designed a questionnaire survey which includes their income, conception about the water they take away from home, water sources they drink water from. We conduct our survey on some locations where we can find floating people in a large amount. Our basic survey locations are stations and market places at several point of Dhaka city. We conducted the survey on a total of 220 people. Our questionnaire was designed as close ended questions. Then the data collected are being analyzed by using Microsoft excel to obtain the graphical information. Finally we analyzed the data by using SPSS 16.0 software which is a vi Windows based program that can be used to perform data entry and is capable of handling large amounts of data for analysis. By implementing this regression Analysis we have found some positive and negative factor regarding their choice as well as awareness about the water consumption practice. From this study we have observed that people’s income has a significant impact on choosing their source of drinking water while they are away from their residence. Their education level and age also affect their choice of drinking water. There are also other factors working behind their choice. Accessibility to the water source is another important reason. About 41% of the respondents choose their drinking water source because of absence of alternative sources. From study we have also found that a high percentage of people 25% prefer to drink bottle water as they think it is so far the safest source of water to drink while travelling outside. The increase in demand for these corporate labeled water products is driven by few factors like changes in fashion towards the consumption of designer water increased concerns about the contamination of the piped water supply and an increased influx of people at railway and bus stations and in markets as well as at restaurants, with a requirement for good drinking water. It is a matter of concern that a vast portion about 41% of our survey participants have no idea about the water they are taking is treated or not. The high prevalence of diseases such as diarrhea, typhoid fever, cholera and bacillary dysentery among the populace has been traced to the consumption of unsafe water and unhygienic drinking water production practices. As 58% of our survey participants take water outside their home, the amount of water they consume outside their home is not negligible and is a significant portion of daily water consumption. In conclusion we can say that the study was designed in a exploratory way and sought to explore away from home drinking water practice using qualitative methods supplemented by a questionnaire survey and regression analysis of the data collected from the survey. Thus despite of the limitations of the design, this study makes a significant contribution by documenting the away from home drinking water consumption practices and factors that affects significantly.