“Today, water is the name of a natural resource. Tomorrow it might become the name of a humanitarian crisis. Today, water is the major reason behind life. Tomorrow, it might become the major reason behind deaths.” - Shrikant Ulhe Despite the fact that about 70% of our planet is water, we are currently seeing, what Vandana Shiva considers to be the most pervasive, most severe, and most invisible dimension of ecological devastation, an acute global water shortage.
Water scarcity refers to the lack of freshwater resources that are needed to meet the standard water demand. Of course, this demand is incredibly high when we consider that all living things need water to survive. Freshwater makes up a mere three percent of all water covering the earth. The bulk of this freshwater is inaccessible, and so, many humans across the world rely on extremely limited water resources. Today, 1 in 9 persons across the globe, lack access to safe water. That is potable water, water that is clean enough to drink and prepare food with. With a statistic like this, it is impossible to not ask ourselves why this is so.
Experts have narrowed down the cause of water scarcity to four main factors - climate change, natural calamities, increased human consumption, and the overuse and wastage of water worldwide. Of these four factors, human beings have control over three. Indeed, the second face of the phenomena, that is, water scarcity is the fact that the vitality of bodies of fresh water is profusely threatened by human activity. However, while water scarcity, for the most part, is man-made, we still have the ability to allay extenuate this global crisis by implementing some solutions - one of these being the practice of water stewardship.
Water stewardship is defined as using water in a way that is socially equitable, environmentally sustainable, and economically beneficial. A good water steward is someone who understands their own water use and engages in meaningful individual and collective actions that benefit people and nature. This could take the form of taking shorter showers, collecting rainwater, reusing gray water, and even supporting sustainable energy and water reduction initiatives and advocacy groups ( like Yugen).
There’s an old saying that goes, “you will never know the value of the water until the well runs dry”. Perhaps it has taken us too long to understand the value of water, but it is not too late, to save our water’s fate. The practice of water stewardship arms us with the ability to imagine and create a future where water scarcity simply has no place. Today, yes, water is the name of a natural resource, but tomorrow, it does not need to be a humanitarian crisis.
