POOR WATER SUPPLY AND POOR SANITATION

Te Ao Hou, December 1960, Page 8

POOR WATER SUPPLY AND POOR SANITATION Because a large percentage of the Maori population is rural, we find that water supply and sanitation is much below the standard of the European community. In 1947, the average household consumed 40 gallons per head per day. In our hospital, we use 80 gallons per head per day. These figures are an impossible attainment in rural areas dependent upon limited tank supply. But here again, I do not think these problems would be unsurmountable if we were to return to the methods and ways of our ancestors and consider the limitation of families. I think it is still possible to attain a reasonable level of hygiene with limited water supply, if sufficient skill, thought and money are applied to the problem. But the larger the family, the more difficult it is to attain a reasonable level of cleanliness. It is believed that in pre-European days, birth control was fairly rigidly practised by the Maori. You can see this if you know your whakapapas very well, and if you can trace your family tree back, you will understand just how small most Maori families were in the old days. When the Victorian Europeans landed with their large families of eight, nine or ten children, the Maoris looked at them with astonishment. They could not understand these people with their large families. It is thought, however, that when they found easier methods of producing food, when food became more plentiful, that they quickly forgot their methods of control, because the Maori has always loved his children. And when there did not seem to be any necessity to limit families, the methods by which they were limited were lost.