The world met to discuss the burgeoning water crisis after nearly half a century; but commitments on action were largely a reiteration of ongoing work
One in four people globally lives without safely managed
water services or clean drinking water The 1970s was arguably an epochal decade for the UN. The multilateral body held nine major global meetings during these years, each one focused on an emerging threat or opportunity that needed planetary response. It was as if the world was getting ready for a multi-front war on the crises. Nearly all countries participated in these conferences, marking them as global milestones.
The conferences were on the environment (the Stockholm Conference in 1971), on population and on food (both in 1974); on women (1975); on human settlement (1976); on water and on desertification (both in 1977); on science and technology for development (1979); and on new and renewable energy sources (1981).
Over the next four decades, each of these conferences resulted in worldwide changes, often through landmark conventions and global treaties. Most of them were followed up by meetings that provided updates on action taken and reiterated commitments from countries.
But the UN Conference on Water, held in Mar del Plata, Argentina on March 14-25, 1977, stood out as more of an anomaly than a landmark. Unlike other conferences, it was not initiated by any government and no country took ownership of it, even though 105 governments ultimately participated in the meet.
UN records show that three senior officials from the body’s now-defunct Centre for National Resources, Energy and Transport initiated the conference and pursued countries to propose it for approval by the UN General Assembly in 1975. Then, the world waited 46 years for a follow-up to this meet, which came as the UN’s “water conference” held in New York on March 22-24 this year.
The latest conference was held during the International Decade of Action for Water for Sustainable Development (Water Action Decade). Its formal name, 2023 Conference for the Midterm Comprehensive Review of Implementation of the UN Decade for Action on Water and Sanitation (2018-2028, ‘composed of voluntary commitments from UN Member States and stakeholders’), however, does not identify it as a world conference.
The 1977 conference was touted as the first attempt to avoid a water crisis by the end of the 20th century. Notably, it declared that “all people have the right to have access to drinking water equal to their basic needs.”
Its outcome, known as the Mar del Plata Action Plan, mostly revolved around countries’ efforts to better assess the state of water resources, development of mechanisms and technology to manage water for sustainable human and biodiversity use, and international cooperation to tackle challenges.
But at the opening of the 2023 conference, UN Secretary-General António Guterres gave the world a scathing reality check: “Water is in deep trouble. We are draining humanity’s lifeblood through vampiric overconsumption and unsustainable use, and evaporating it through global heating. We’ve broken the water cycle, destroyed ecosystems and contaminated groundwater.”
In an appraisal of the human toll on water that has taken place during the long gap between the two water conferences, Guterres said, “Nearly three out of four natural disasters are linked to water. One in four people lives without safely managed water services or clean drinking water. And over 1.7 billion people lack basic sanitation. Half a billion practice open defecation. And millions of women and girls spend hours every day fetching water.”
Argentina, the host of the 1977 conference, is seeing record-breaking rainfall deficit for the third consecutive year. Its soybean production has dipped by 44 per cent and wheat production by 31 per cent.
On the first day, delegate after delegate acknowledged that global stocktaking on water has had too long a pause. The World Health Organization (WHO) added urgency with a new set of data: globally, more than 700 children under the age of five die every day from diarrhoea linked to lack of access to safe water and sanitation.
“On average, a four-fold increase in current rates of progress would be required to achieve universal coverage by 2030. Achieving these targets would help save 829,000 lives annually, which is currently the number of people that die from diseases directly related to unsafe water, inadequate sanitation and poor hygiene practices,” it said.
For 40 hours in New York, some 10,000 participants debated and discussed the future of water and the global response to the crisis that is already wreaking havoc.
Reiterating a statement that was made in 1977 (and is now a widely-accepted principle), they declared that water should be treated as a global common good. In effect, the only difference from 1977 is that the recent conference included climate change and the food production system in the global water discourse.
On the last day, some 700 voluntary commitments were made by countries, private corporations and multilateral agencies. These were bundled into a “Water Action Agenda”. “The commitments at this conference will propel humanity towards the water-secure future every person on the planet needs,” said Guterres.
The Water Action Agenda falls short of outcomes expected from the conference. Before it commenced, there was hope for a formal agreement on water, similar to those on climate change (UN Framework Convention on Climate Change) and on biodiversity (UN Convention on Biological Diversity).
“This conference did not give us a mandate for this, but we brought the world together to ensure there is a follow-up,” Henk Ovink, special envoy for water for the Netherlands, which co-hosted the conference with Tajikistan, said at a media briefing.
“We have fragmented water governance across the world, fragmented finance and not enough science and data in place,” he said.
UN General Assembly President Csaba Korosi said in total, more than US $300 billion was pledged. “The outcome of this conference is not a legally binding document, but it still turns the page of history,” he said in his closing remarks.
The 700 commitments are mostly based on countries’ and agencies’ ongoing investments in the water sector or on national programmes being implemented for decades to deal with local water and sanitation challenges.
For instance, the US announced a commitment of up to $49 billion in investments to support climate-resilient water and sanitation infrastructure and services. These investments are already a part of the country’s climate and water sector programmes.
Japan announced that it will “proactively” contribute to solutions for water-related social issues faced by the Asia-Pacific region, by developing “quality infrastructure” and providing financial assistance worth approximately 500 billion yen ($3.65 billion) over the next five years.
Japan has been a prolific funder of such infrastructure programmes through Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), which aids socio-economic growth of developing nations.
Vietnam pledged to develop policies by 2025 for management of major river basins and to ensure that all households have access to clean running water by 2030—these have been a part of its national development goals since the 1990s.
Union Minister of Jal Shakti Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, who represented India at the conference, said the country’s commitment to the Water Action Decade was unwavering and cited ongoing water-related programmes.
“India has committed investments of over $240 billion in the water sector and is implementing the largest dam rehabilitation programme in the world as well as efforts to restore groundwater level,” he said at the plenary.
Heads of state from Africa, which suffers the most from water- and sanitation-related diseases and economic burdens, announced presidential compacts reiterating top political commitments to the water sector.
The African Union Commission and the Continental Africa Investment Programme, which focuses on climate-resilient water and sanitation investments, made a declaration on closing the region’s water investments gap by mobilising at least $30 billion per year by 2030 through a range of initiatives.
Most African countries reiterated national plans to meet Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 for safe water and sanitation. The Mozambique government committed to taking “all necessary steps” to accelerate achievement of SDG 6 by 2030, with investments of $9.5 billion.
The Niger Basin Authority (NBA), an intergovernmental body comprising nine African countries, and the German environment ministry made a joint commitment of $21.2 million in funding for a project to strengthen integrated water resource management in NBA member countries. This project is already underway.
The EU announced a pledge to support access to 70 million individuals to an improved drinking water source and/or sanitation facility by 2030, as well as a commitment to provide member-states with €20 million ($21.8 million) in funding to accelerate deployment of wastewater surveillance for COVID-19.
Switzerland, a non-EU nation, submitted five commitments to contribute to the UN’s work, including for the Water Convention, set up by the UN Economic Commission for Europe to ensure sustainable use of transboundary water resources.
On March 24, after the Water Action Agenda was adopted, 114 experts from institutions and civil society groups from worldwide wrote to Guterres, stating “grave concern” over a lack of decisive action for water. “We urge you to demonstrate bold leadership to dramatically raise the level of accountability, rigor and ambition within the Conference outcomes to reflect the gravity and urgency of our global water challenges,” they said.
On the 700 commitments, they said, “We fear that their disparate and uncoordinated nature will further fracture an already fragmented sector and occupy political space on water without unlocking substantive progress. As voluntary commitments, they are likely to suffer from woefully low levels of accountability which will conspire against effective delivery.”
“Trying to solve one of the greatest challenges facing humanity with voluntary commitments and solutions based on half-baked evidence is like taking a knife to a gunfight—it simply is not good enough and represents a betrayal of the world’s poor who bear the brunt of the water crisis,” said Nick Hepworth, executive director of Scotland-based non-profit Water Witness International and a signatory of the letter, at a side event during the conference.
The World Resources Institute, a research non-profit, in an analysis of the commitments, says, “More than 290 commitments submitted to the Water Action Agenda—74 per cent of the total, as of March 18—lacked clear funding targets. Commitments are meaningless without the finance to put them into action.”
Charles Iceland, global director for water at the institute, says only about a third of the pledges were “gamechangers” that would substantially improve the crisis. “I think the voluntary commitments are a good start...Each voluntary commitment has a place where you talk about how much money is available, most of them left that blank.”
This was first published in the 16-30 April, 2023 print edition of Down To Earth
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