Universalização e equidade: o abastecimento de água e o esgotamento sanitário como direitos humanos no município de Pirapora / MG

Abstract

Access to drinking water and sanitary exhaustion, primary needs to maintain life, are internationally recognized human rights in Resolution Nº64/292 of 2010 of the General Assembly of the United Nations Organization - UN, of which Brazil is a signatory. Thus, they must be in a universal and indiscriminatory way. Considering the inequality of access to these services in the world, an inequality that is accentuated in Brazil, it is a condition for universalization that such provision is based, among other principles, on equity. Due to the scale and complexity of the infrastructure required for water supply and sanitary exhaustion, and also considering these accesses as social rights, it is the responsibility of the State to provide them. The State has historically acted as a producer of cities through the implementation of infrastructure, in non-neutral actions that tend to prioritize the areas of market interest. Therefore, it is necessary and urgent that public policies for water supply and sanitary exhaustion are based on the principles of universalization and equity and the recognition of these as universal human rights. Therefore, the objective of this research is to investigate the observance of equity, the search for universalization and the recognition of the Human Right to Water and Sanitation in public policies of Pirapora/MG. As a methodological approach, a search was conducted in the municipal sanitation and urban planning instruments for evidence of compliance with the principles of equity and efforts towards universalization, as well as the recognition of access to services as human rights. Islands of exclusion from water supply and sewage systems were also identified, characterizing them as areas of infrastructural vulnerability. In Pirapora/MG the implementation of water supply and sanitary exhaustion services reflects the Brazilian reality, with priority given to water supply, large deficits in sanitary sewage, exclusion of rural and irregular areas, and the lack of effectiveness of the equity principles in public policies.