Do We Need a Water Ethics Charter?
David Groenfeldt is a PhD anthropologist who founded (2009) and directs the Water-Culture Institute ("Adding Values to Water Policies') in Santa Fe, NM. The Institute (WCI) also runs the Water Ethics Network.
He's the author of a recent book, Water Ethics: A Values Approach to Solving the Water Crisis.
I am writing to enlist your support for safeguarding water ecosystems -- all of them, everywhere.
The Water-Culture Institute is developing a new way of thinking about water that is based on a very old principle common to Indigenous Peoples everywhere: Putting Nature's needs ahead of our own immediate desires, so we will all be better off over the long term. The image of flowing rivers with clean water and healthy fish is not just a romantic idea from the past, but a realistic and necessary expectation for the future. We need to, and we can, adopt nature-friendly principles to support a sustainable water future.
The approach we are taking is to draft a new statement of principles about water, a "Water Ethics Charter" and then seek endorsements from cities, corporations, and other organizations who will pledge to uphold those principles. The text of the Charter will be finalized during 2014 and will include the intrinsic value and rights of nature, and ideas of social and cultural justice. The Charter will provide cities and businesses with clear moral reasons to respect nature in their decisions about water use and management. For details about how this process will work, see the "water ethics" page of our website.
Our partners in this effort include UNESCO, the French Water Academy, the Club of Rome, and other groups representing both environmental, corporate, indigenous, youth, and other perspectives. The Water-Culture Institute serves as the lead organization among these groups (for purposes of this initiative), but we need to raise our own funds to provide effective leadership. Will you help us provide that leadership?
Promote social and legal reconciliation among diverse stakeholders through values-based deliberation and consensus around a shared water ethic.
This will be a tough, but necessary, sell.
The Water Ethics Charter (WEC) movement as described herein arose from a session at the Sixth World Water Forum in Marseille, 2012 March: "Toward an Ethical and Spiritual Approach to Water". A mechanism was established to develop a WEC for presentation at the Seventh World Water Forum in South Korea, 2015 March. The WCI has been designated the lead organization in this effort. A steering committee exists but I could not find its composition. I suspect (and hope) Cynthia Barnett is involved.
In his email David also asked for financial assistance to help the WCI fulfill its role as WEC lead organization. All contributions will be matched 1:1 by the Kalliopeia Foundation (up to $8,500). You can donate online or send a check (get WCI's address from the site). It is tax-deductible for US taxpayers.
This is a worthwhile endeavor. I wish it and David success. I just did my part.
And development of a WEC is a good resolution for 2014.
"The water ethic begins with that one, brave steward. Then, it spreads out into the community, building collective courage among citizens, businesspeople, church members, political leaders. Just like ripples of children playing in a wide, free river." - Cynthia Barnett,Blue Revolution: Unmaking America's Water Crisis, p. 229.
Elaine and Spot will be bidding adieu for 2013 but they will be back in 2014.
Is El Hierro volcano getting ready to erupt again?
What is the recurrence interval for the EQ that caused the Sumatran tsunami?
Drilling progress of Bertha beneath Seattle grinds to a halt …. WHY? What did Bertha hit??
Mother-to-child transmission of Chagas disease in Japan….Chagas is also endemic to the US!
Is engineered bio-fortification of rice to increase iron content the answer to malnutrition?
Pigs versus scenery….which is more important?
How have plants evolved to adapt to cold climate?
Do we need more realistic projections on future food yields?
Can aquaculture to raise fish for food be environmentally sustainable?
How to overcome "nature-deficient disorder"….play in the dirt with your children!!
Bringing back milkweed to bring back the butterfly!
Given the human damage to the planet….can human civilization exist indefinitely?
Charismatic animals can help conservation!
Educate the public…and they stopped putting "flushable wipes" down the drain!!
Chemical risk protection: is it based on science? or politics? or environmentalism?
Peter Weikard, and David Zetland (shown here).
Marianne Schuerhoff, Hans-Peter Weikard and David Zetland have published their paper "The life and death of the Dutch Groundwater tax" in Water Policy. In the framework of our UNESCO-related groundwater governance meeting in March 2013 we could offer you a pre-release of the paper already. The authors examine the Dutch national groundwater tax — a "win-win-win green tax" that promised to simultaneously provide revenue to government, reduce the relative burden of other taxes on productive behaviour (e.g., income tax), and improve environmental outcomes.
They found that the Dutch national groundwater tax generated revenue without having a noticeable impact on production incentives or environmental health. Although the Dutch national groundwater tax is often cited as an example of environmental economics in action, it was neither designed, implemented nor operated in accordance with environmental goals. In many ways, the Dutch national groundwater tax was just another source of revenue — and one that bothered special interests. The Dutch government revoked the "inefficient" GWT on 31 December 2011.
We examine the Dutch national groundwater tax (GWT) – a 'win–win, green' tax that promised to reduce distortions by simultaneously reducing the income tax burden and improving environmental outcomes. We find no evidence of these impacts. Instead, we see that the GWT increased distortions by taxing a narrow base (a few drinking-water companies reliant on raw groundwater) and interfering with groundwater management programmes funded by an existing provincial groundwater fee. The Dutch government revoked the GWT for being fiscally inefficient and environmentally unhelpful on 31 December 2011, but this story provides some useful lessons.
Looks some real good lessons can be learned here.
Appropriate post for the celebration of the 40th birthday of the Endangered Species Act, signed into law on 28 December 1973 by President Richard M. Nixon.
'Environmental flows' - that's fine, but what is this 'Anthropocene' stuff?
Lest you've been living in a cave for the past few years, you know that 'Anthropocene' is a common informal term denoting a certain period ('epoch') of geological time during which humans have had a profound effect on Earth and its various processes and environments. It is informal because its use has not been formally approved by the International Commission on Stratigraphy; as far as the ICS is concerned, we are still in the Holocene Epoch, which began 11,700 years ago. But regardless of what the ICS decides (2014 or 2015, I believe), the term is not going away anytime soon. What really needs to be determined is when the Holocene ended and the Anthropocene began. 1950? 1800? 10,000 BCE? Stay tuned.
But I have digressed too much.
LeRoy Poff and John Matthews have just published an interesting paper on 'Environmental flows in the Anthropocene: past progress and future prospects'. Human modification of the global hydrologic cycle through the building and operation of hundreds of thousands of dams and diversions has significantly altered fluvial processes, leading to impairment of river ecosystem function and biodiversity loss worldwide. The concept of environmental flows (e-flows) emerged to mitigate the undesirable hydrological impacts of dams and water diversions, in order to strengthen ecologically informed water management. In their paper, the authors outline the scientific foundations and progressive development of the current e-flows framework over the last 25 years, identifying three discrete periods in its history: emergence and synthesis, consolidation and expansion, and globalization.
They further highlight the evolving challenges and audiences that e-flows engages, and discuss the challenges facing the framework during the current period of rapid global change. For e-flows to contribute most effectively to sustainable freshwater management on a global scale, it must, first, move from a focus on restoration to one of adaptation to climate and other environmental change stressors, second, expand its scale from single sites to whole river basins, and third, broaden its audience to embrace social-ecological sustainability that balances freshwater conservation needs with human well-being in both developing and developed economies alike.
Human modification of the global hydrologic cycle through the building and operation of hundreds of thousands of dams and diversions has significantly altered fluvial processes, leading to impairment of river ecosystem function and biodiversity loss worldwide. The concept of environmental flows (e-flows) emerged to mitigate the undesirable hydrological impacts of dams and water diversions, in order to strengthen ecologically informed water management. In this paper, we outline the scientific foundations and progressive development of the current e-flows framework over the last 25 years, identifying three discrete periods in its history: emergence and synthesis, consolidation and expansion, and globalization. We highlight the evolving challenges and audiences that e-flows engages, and discuss the challenges facing the framework during the current period of rapid global change. For e-flows to contribute most effectively to sustainable freshwater management on a global scale, it must, first, move from a focus on restoration to one of adaptation to climate and other environmental change stressors, second, expand its scale from single sites to whole river basins, and third, broaden its audience to embrace social- ecological sustainability that balances freshwater conservation needs with human well-being in both developing and developed economies alike.
Very good reading - enjoy!
The picture shown here (Tweeted by James Johnstone) is by Canadian photographer/artist Edward Burtynsky. Landscapes altered by industry are perhaps his best-known works.
Not about water, but...50 years ago today (26 Dec 1962), Capitol Records released 'I Want To Hold Your Hand' in the USA.
"Going to Africa. Hope I don't get AIDS. Just kidding! I'm white." - Justine Sacco Infamous Tweet she posted before boarding a plane to South Africa. By the time she landed, it had gone viral. She was fired shortly afterwards. She was a PR Executive.