News headlines for “Water and Development”, page 104
Concerns Mount as U.S. Plans Major Natural Gas Exports
- Inter Press Service
WASHINGTON, Mar 26 (IPS) - Environmentalists and others here are reacting with concern to a surprise announcement on Monday of a major deal that would see U.S. natural gas exported to the United Kingdom, marking the first time that such sales have been permitted.
/UPDATE*/Boreholes, Boreholes Everywhere….And Not a Drop to Drink
- Inter Press Service
MBABANE, Mar 25 (IPS) - Every day for the last four years, 52-year-old Tintfombi Msibi has had to walk past the borehole in her village of Ekuphakameni, one of the driest rural villages in southern Swaziland, to a dirty stream two kilometres away to collect drinking water.
Boreholes, Boreholes Everywhere….And Not a Drop to Drink
- Inter Press Service
MBABANE, Mar 22 (IPS) - Every day for the last four years, 52-year-old Tintfombi Msibi has had to walk past the borehole in her village of Ekuphakameni, one of the driest rural villages in southern Swaziland, to a dirty stream two kilometres away to collect drinking water.
- Inter Press Service
UXBRIDGE, Canada, Mar 22 (IPS) - How much water does it take to turn on a light? It took 10,000 litres to make your jeans. Another three big bathtubs of water was needed for your two-eggs-toast-coffee breakfast this morning.
Water and Sanitation Seek Rightful Place in Post-2015 Agenda
- Inter Press Service
UNITED NATIONS, Mar 19 (IPS) - When the General Assembly unanimously adopted the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) back in 2000, water and sanitation were reduced to a subtext - never a stand-alone goal compared with poverty and hunger alleviation.
Food Policies Failing the World's Hungry
- Inter Press Service
WASHINGTON, Mar 16 (IPS) - The world's food security remains "vulnerable", new data suggests, with some 870 million people experiencing sustained hunger and two billion suffering from micronutrient deficiencies.
Transparency Could Tighten Drought Policy
- Inter Press Service
GENEVA, Mar 15 (IPS) - Scientists gathered in Geneva for the first High-level Meeting on National Drought Policy (HMNDP) in over 30 years have identified data collection and sharing as some of the main challenges to effective prevention of drought. Clear goals and strong political will are vital to building policies at the national level, they say.
Q&A: Water Disputes Get Resolved While Other Conflicts Rage
- Inter Press Service
UNITED NATIONS, Mar 13 (IPS) - What has education, science and culture to do with one of the world's most scarce and finite resources?
Plenty, says the United Nations, which has designated the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) as the lead agency to promote the 2013 International Year of Water Cooperation (IYWC).
Asked if water is more an area for potential conflicts or an area for mutual cooperation, UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova told IPS, "Water acts as a unifier."
She said the historical record shows that water disputes do get resolved, even among bitter enemies, and even as conflicts drag out over other issues.
"Some of the most vociferous enemies around the world have negotiated water agreements or are in the process of doing so," said Bokova, a former foreign minister of Bulgaria, who studied at the University of Maryland and at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government.
In an interview with IPS, she said "it is often said that water can be a source of conflict.
"But at UNESCO, we are guided by the opposite idea - we want to see water as a tremendous resource for cooperation, for exchange and joint work between States and societies," said Bokova, the first woman to head UNESCO, and who is expected to run for a second four-year term, come October.
According to the United Nations, the IYWC will highlight "the history of successful water cooperation initiatives, as well as identify burning issues on water education, water diplomacy, trans-boundary water management, financing cooperation, national/international legal frameworks, and the linkages with the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)."
Bokova said, "We need a new vision that marries social equity, environmental protection and sustainable economic development as part of a single agenda for a more sustainable world."
She said UNESCO strongly believes that water must lie at the heart of this vision, and water diplomacy is an essential tool of 'soft power' for a more peaceful world.
Excerpts from the interview follow.
Q: What are the specific areas of cooperation between, and among, countries now?
A: The Mekong Committee has functioned since 1957, exchanging data throughout the Vietnam War. Secret "picnic table" talks have been held between Israel and Jordan since the unsuccessful Johnston negotiations of 1953 to 1955, even as these riparians until only recently were in a legal state of war.
The Indus River Commission survived through two wars between India and Pakistan. And all ten Nile riparians are currently involved in negotiations over cooperative development of the basin.
There are numerous examples where trans-boundary waters have proved to be a source of cooperation rather than conflict. Nearly 450 agreements on international waters were signed between 1820 and 2007. And over 90 international water agreements were drawn up to help manage shared water basins on the African continent.
Q: Are the U.N.'s efforts at "water cooperation" feasible against the backdrop of water-sharing conflicts between India-Pakistan? Israel-Jordan? Palestine-Israel?
A: The role of the United Nations is to offer a platform for dialogue and communication through the tools that are available to the system. Each agency facilitates cooperation from a specific angle of intervention.
UNESCO, for example, uses education and science as a means to intervene in a situation where cooperation needs to be established or enhanced. Two unique programmes provide the organisation's member states with the scientific backbone needed for any water management issue at any level - from the local to the national, regional and international levels.
Firstly, the International Hydrological Programme (IHP) is the only intergovernmental scientific cooperative programme that aims at helping member states manage their water resources and address the needs of their peoples through science and education.
And, secondly, he World Water Assessment Programme (WWAP) which provides invaluable data and regular assessments of the planet's water resources, without which decision makers cannot move forward with their decisions making processes.
Q: Any concrete examples?
A: Example 1: UNESCO's Potential Conflict to Cooperation Potential (PCCP) programme, which is an associated programme of both IHP and WWAP, facilitates multi-level and interdisciplinary dialogue to foster peace, cooperation and development by building capacity to manage trans-boundary water resources.
For example, research on Lake Titicaca involved stakeholders from both Bolivia and Peru. A joint document was prepared outlining the status of conflict and cooperation in this trans-boundary water body.
In 1992, Bolivia and Peru created the Bi-national Autonomous Authority of Lake Titicaca recognising the importance of the joint management of the lake.
Drought Hits Policies
- Inter Press Service
GENEVA, Mar 13 (IPS) - Drought has dramatically increased as a consequence of climate change. Most countries react to it only after it has occurred, but don't have national policies to prevent it. The high-level meeting on national drought policies in Geneva this week is trying to match scientific knowledge with political awareness.
India Strives to Become ‘Drought Proof’
- Inter Press Service
HYDERABAD, India, Mar 12 (IPS) - In a country of 1.2 billion people, the threat of drought takes on epic proportions.
Over a period of two centuries (between 1801 and 2002), India experienced 42 severe droughts, according to the Indian Space Research Organisation. One of these, in 1979, cut food grain production by 20 percent; another, in 1987, damaged 58.6 million hectares of cultivated land, affecting 285 million people.
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