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Q&A: "Safe Drinking Water for Astronauts, Not Slum Dwellers"

Thalif Deen interviews Anders Berntell, Executive Director of the Stockholm International Water Institute*

STOCKHOLM, Aug 18 2009 (IPS) - "We can provide astronauts with a safe supply of drinking water when they travel to the moon, but we cannot provide the same service to slum dwellers in Kibera, Nairobi or Dharavi, Mumbai," Anders Berntell, executive director of the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI), told a gathering of over 2,400 participants at the annual World Water Week concluding Friday.

Pointing out the inequities and disparities in the supply and distribution of water worldwide, Berntell said the international community needs to find solutions that give the poorer segments of societies access to these services, while at the same time ensuring that the institutions that deliver those services are economically viable.

The annual World Water Week, attended by scientists, government policy makers, private sector representatives, international organisations, donors and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), attracts the largest number of water experts to gather under one roof.

The theme of this year's conference is 'Accessing Water for the Common Good'.

"We are convinced that water is something that strongly contributes to the social and economic development of people and countries," Berntell said, "And reducing people's access to water will seriously affect the functions of our society."

Currently, over 880 million people worldwide still lack safe drinking water, and about 2.5 billion people don't have access to basic sanitation, with 1.2 billion having no sanitation at all, according to the United Nations.

In an interview with U.N. Bureau Chief Thalif Deen in Stockholm, Berntell was confident the international community would be able to meet the MDGs by halving the number of people without access to safe drinking water.

But he was sceptical that developing nations will be able to meet the target for sanitation. "It's horribly off," he said.

Excerpts from the interview follow.

IPS: The MDGs seek to reduce, by at least 50 percent, the number of people with no access to safe drinking water by 2015. Since the global water crisis continues to grow, do you think this deadline will be met? If not, how? ANDERS BERNTELL: Well, I do think we can reach the specific MDG on safe drinking water. We're certainly doing much better there than we are for the related MDG in sanitation, where we are horribly off track by large numbers. The question, I think, is how well we manage water services and how we meet increasing demands from growing populations.

Climate change will also complicate matters, and we will need to think about adaptation measures. So, yes, we can meet the MDG on drinking water. Whether or not we do so will depend on how good we are at handling all the variables.

IPS: The United Nations is holding a world summit on climate change in New York on Sep. 22, to be attended by over 150 world leaders. How severe is the impact of climate change on global water resources? And should water be at least on the peripheral agenda of this summit? AB: Water should be part of every climate discussion. It is the medium through which climate change manifests its most serious impacts, and it's the logical frontline for adaptation measures. We have to break through some traditional thinking that has put water and climate in distinct boxes.

You truly cannot address one without considering the other. Even the U.N.'s own Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has concluded that water resources have not been adequately considered in climate discussions.

So, should the U.N. put water on its climate agenda? Yes, immediately. Climate change seems to be happening even faster than expected. The world simply cannot afford any more time wasted on this obvious question.

IPS: Why have climate change negotiators in general been unwilling so far to include specific references to the need to address water? AB: The reason from their side is that water is a sector and we cannot at this stage discuss sector-specific measures in the negotiations. This is, however, a very serious misconception. Water is not just another sector. Water is one of the elements of our planet. Water, the lakes, rivers and the groundwater is the bloodstream of our planet, as our own Senior Scientific Advisor, Professor Malin Falkenmark, put it back in the 1970s.

All the other sectors of our society depend on water. When we affect the availability of water, we affect food production, we affect energy production, we affect forestry, we affect the health status of countries and so on. All functions of our society will be affected when water is affected.

IPS: Since this year's water conference will also focus specifically on transboundary waters within and between nations, do you foresee this more as a source of conflict or a source of collaboration in the future? AB: We should be realistic and accept that conflict and collaboration are both possible. We believe, however, there is a very strong case to be made for cooperation and collaboration. It's our task, I think, to make that case clear to riparian nations in transboundary water basins where the stakeholders are contending for the water.

We need to realize that we can influence the choice. We can do that by developing and sharing a body of knowledge about transboundary water management, and helping to establish a "level playing field" in regions where there is an imbalance of power or influence.

Ultimately, we need to help transboundary stakeholders focus on developing benefits from their jointly shared water resources rather than just competing for access and volume. * Not for publication in Italy.