“Water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink.” In these lines, Samuel Taylor Coleridge made a prescient point: while seawater is plentiful, people can survive only with fresh water. This surprisingly scarce resource is the lynchpin sustaining human lives and healthy ecosystems across our rich biosphere: the most vital resource for life on Earth as we know it. Yet despite its vital importance to humanity, the global water crisis has failed to take priority in the public consciousness.
This year, for the first time, there is cause for optimism. In an unprecedented moment for the global water debate, His Holiness Pope Francis inspired a global conversation by opening World Water Day. As Pope Francis noted in his address to a Pontifical conference on the human right to water: “[Our concerns] are basic and pressing. Basic, because where there is water there is life, making it possible for societies to arise and advance. Pressing, because our common home needs to be protected.” Yet, water and the freshwater ecosystems that sustain it are under-valued, poorly managed and increasingly depleted. A common paradox is that, whether a crisis of dearth or abundance, there’s a water problem everywhere on Earth. Half of the […]
Full article: How do we prevent today’s water crisis becoming tomorrow’s catastrophe?
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How do we prevent today’s water crisis becoming tomorrow’s catastrophe?