America.gov (Washington, DC)
Nancy L. Pontius
4 September 2008
Littleton — Conflicts over water supplies strike at the heart of what people and wildlife need to survive, as in Africa, where Kenyan subsistence farmers compete for limited water with world-renowned Tanzanian wildlife reserves. Globally, water disputes between countries and between the powerful and the powerless create complex situations where fair resolution is critical.
To assist in these complicated situations, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Global Water for Sustainability (GLOWS) program is working to help resolve water conflicts in projects on three continents. The program is backed by a consortium of international and local partners working to provide sustainable clean water to people and ecosystems.
GLOWS follows a methodology known as integrated water resources management (IWRM). "The international community has reached a consensus that IWRM is the best approach for managing water resources," Michael McClain, director of the GLOWS program, told America.gov. "IWRM balances human needs for water without causing unacceptable degradation to the environment," he said.
GLOWS integrated water resources management includes the following activities:
• partnering with local, regional and national governments and decision makers;
• striving to achieve ecological health for the entire watershed;
• involving both genders (whose roles normally differ) in project goals, to ensure success; and
• stressing equity among user groups, and giving a voice to underrepresented groups.
In an oil-rich region of Ecuador and Peru, GLOWS is working to help resolve a conflict between indigenous people who live off the land in the Pastaza River Basin and outside economic interests focused on oil exploration and commercial fishing.
Here, GLOWS intends "to enhance the capacity of indigenous people to negotiate with more powerful government and economic interests to both preserve the environment and utilize it productively," said Allan Rosenbaum, director of the Institute for Public Management and Community Service at Florida International University.
Workers labor in a rice paddy in the Wakal River Basin in southern Rajasthan, India.
"GLOWS is a partnership of organizations, each of which brings specific expertise and their combined, nearly worldwide presence," said McClain. The USAID consortium, led by Florida International University, includes the World Wildlife Fund, World Vision, CARE, and Winrock International.
"The program works on the ground, in field projects," said McClain, "as well as through capacity building, training and communicating lessons learned to the global community, such as during World Water Week." (See "2008 World Water Week Highlights Water-Related Challenges.")
In India, a GLOWS project in a desert area seeks to help communities who depend on subsistence agriculture. "Women literally walk one hour with 10 kilos [22 pounds] of water on their heads" each way to collect water, said Rosenbaum.
"The goal is to help educate [citizens] about better land use and water management techniques, such as irrigation systems, effective water storage and rainwater harvesting," he said. "GLOWS is also encouraging people to utilize water more efficiently" and to try new methods for drilling wells and distributing water.
KENYA AND TANZANIA
In an African region known for its spectacular wildlife preserves, the Mara River is needed by both Kenya and Tanzania for agriculture, tourist resorts and wildlife. To assist these two countries with developing an agreement for using these transboundary waters, "GLOWS is encouraging these [countries] with competing needs to work collaboratively and productively in utilizing water resources," said Rosenbaum.
"Thankfully, both countries have passed laws and policies to follow the IWRM approach in resolving this water conflict," McClain said, "which provides an excellent foundation for reaching a satisfactory resolution."
"GLOWS hopes to learn lessons from this African project that can help in resolving similar conflicts over hundreds of rivers around the world that are controlled by more than one country," he said.
More information about the USAID GLOWS program is available on the GLOWS Web site.
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I am glad that your organization is promoting water solutions. I will be travelling to Kenya soon to showcase another alternative that has immediate results. As you are aware Cholera is a significant problem in areas lacking water and Kenya is has many situations including those in what I believe is the largest refugee camp in the world.
Our solutions are not a panacea and could be considered short term (5 to 10 years) but the benefits are: 1. Easy to deploy. 2. Mobile 3. Pure cleaning water without chemicals, minute amounts of salt or lack of minerals. 4. Simple to maintain. 5. Based on technology available world wide.
The solutions range from small family based (up to 30 litres a day) to larger small community based (5000 litres a day).
If you are interested in learning more about this or my visit simply reply with an email that I can contact you at.
Thank you.