Water, Water Everywhere
‘Nor Any Drop to Drink.’ This quote from Coleridge’s ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ provided the title for a day of serious but engaging public lectures, marking World Water Day:
UN and government advisor Asit K. Biswas, on the reasons why, in a prosperous world, we are still not able to provide clean, drinkable water to all its urban centres.
Anthony Cox, Head of the Environment Directorate at the OECD, on issues of providing access to clean water on a global scale.
In keeping with Puttnam’s argument that tackling climate change requires both individuals and governments to respond, the IAS teamed up with Northumbrian Water to put on a public day of lectures to mark World Water Day 2010, entitled Water, Water Everywhere, Nor Any Drop to Drink: The Myths, Realities, Challenges and Opportunities Concerning Access to Water in the 21st Century. This brought representatives from the United Nations, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, and the Royal Scientific Society in Jordan to talk to the Durham public and academic community about the economic, political and geographical challenges in providing access to water across the globe.
Although water shortages caused by bad policy decisions are a major problem in the developing world, the world as a whole also confronts crises of flooding, shortage, and erosion caused by climactic events, which are becoming increasingly unpredictable. A multidisciplinary team of climate scientists, hydrologists, engineers and geographers gathered in Durham for the Water: Resource or Hazard? workshop to model the uncertainty that exists in relation to predicting future climate events and their impacts. Participants agreed to collaborate in a joint application for funding to the EPSRC to address some of the challenges identified at the workshop.
Muhammad Saidam, IAS Fellow and Director of the Environment Monitoring and Research Central Unit at the Royal Scientific Society in Jordan, on the impact of water scarcity on food production.
The lectures were organised by the IAS and Northumbrian Water and were chaired by Northumbrian Water’s Managing Director, Mr John Cuthbert.
A copy of the position statement from the workshop on Global Water Regulation is available at:
www.durham.ac.uk/ias/events/thematic/globalwaterregulation
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