ARTICLE: Water Sustainability: from awareness to action in British Columbia

BCWWA Annual Conference showcases “Convening for Action”

Partnerships, partnerships, partnerships! This was the key message at a half-day reporting out session on ‘Water Sustainability – Convening for Action in British Columbia’, held as part of the 2007 Annual Conference of the British Columbia Water & Waste Association (BCWWA).

The Convening for Action session provided implementation updates on how a water-centric approach to community planning and development is being advanced under the partnership umbrella of the Water Sustainability Action Plan for British Columbia.

To Learn More:

To download a copy of an article published in September 2007 by Environmental Science & Engineering Magazine, click on Water Sustainability: from awareness to action in British Columbia. The half-day program comprised a set of cascading presentations, with each presentation addressing an element of the Action Plan.

Water is the Integrator

“Water is the piece that integrates everything that we care about. You will note that we are using the phrase water stewardship, not water management. Stewardship is about replacing self interest, dependency and control with service, responsibility and partnership,” stated Lynn Kriwoken, Director of the Ministry of Environment’s Water Stewardship Division. In her presentation, she quoted extensively from James Hoggan’s research on Communicating Sustainability.

“Stewardship is an obligation that we all have”, added Raymond Fung, Chair of the Water Sustainability Committee, “And the key to moving from awareness to action is to form partnerships. Partnerships provide a good way to share risks. The Water Balance Model is a prime example of spreading the risk by banding together.”