United States' island territories and affiliates in the Pacific require over half a billion US dollars to upgrade environmental infrastructure, such as water systems, over the next five to 10 years.
A preliminary consultant's report that Guam, the CNMI, and American Samoa need hundreds of millions of dollars over the next five years for the upgrade of water, sewerage, wastewater, and waste disposal systems.
The US Interior Department's director of Insular Affairs, Nikolao Pula says these are needs that cannot be met by existing resources in the territories or through existing federal funding.
Mr Pula says the current funding only totals 20 million dollars a year.
Based on the report, the CNMI would require 173 million, Guam 315 million and American Samoa over 50 million dollars.
