The concept of available water and safe water in not the same. According to UNICEF and World Health Organization (WHO), 97% of the people of Bangladesh have access to water but only 34.6% percent gave to clean drinking water. Sustainable Development Goal number 6 aims at clean water and sanitation. According to WaterAid Bangladesh, 4.9 million people still do not have clean water source near their household parameters. In some cases like under developed and rural safe drinking water near house perimeter is even scarce. 

Clean water scarcity is severe in the coastal areas of Bangladesh. People living in the southwest coastal areas of Bangladesh are the deprived of clean drinking water. Their water source is contaminated by arsenic, iron and salinity. These areas also fall prey to cyclones which damages their water sources. So, People living in these areas are forced to travel 200m to 1km for safe drinking water from various sources. Considering their misfortune and the heavy rainfall Bangladesh experiences, rainwater harvesting on mass scale can ensure safe drinking water for all.

Rainwater Harvesting is a simple method that has been practiced all over the world in both drinking and industrial purposes. The technology is simple, all that needed is a functioning roof, which is used to collect water during rainfalls and a storage tank to store the collected water. The advocacy for rainwater harvesting is strong because it is a source of clean drinking water that comes at a cheap rate and doesn’t require high maintenance. The only cost is the installation cost of the tank and slight adjustment of the roof like setting up pipes and ducts to convey the rainwater.

Rainwater harvesting can be promoted as the safe drinking source. There have been cases of people using rainwater harvesting in small scale to collect water regardless of their economic background. people who use rainwater harvesting in these areas are satisfied with it and prefer this over other sources. They store the water in tanks, jars, motkas and some poor people even store it in bottles. Collected water samples prove that the rainwater is safe. The majority of the people here know about rainwater harvesting and are keen to install rainwater-harvesting systems. 

Rainwater harvesting can tackle another major problem that we have not yet paid attention to. The major source of water in most cities in Bangladesh is groundwater and the level of groundwater is falling. According to several studies, which focused on groundwater depletion, the level of aquifers where water is stored below the soil in Dhaka has fallen to as much as 61m and in Chittagong it varies from 7m to 35 meters. According to 2030 Water Resources Group, groundwater level in Dhaka city falls 3m per year. If the demand increases and preventive measures are ignored groundwater levels will fall to 100-150m by 2050. Both cities face water scarcity issues and it will continue to increase. 

RAiN Forum is a non-profit voluntary organization established to tackle the upcoming water crisis. It is a platform for knowledge sharing and promotion of safe water among scientist, engineers, architects, planners, academicians, practitioners, administrators, students and others who are directly or indirectly concerned in sustainable water management. RAiN Forum provide rainwater harvesting consultancy for industries and households and also does feasibility studies to ensure that rainwater harvesting can reach the mass level.