“Convening for Action in British Columbia” launched at Okanagan Conference in February 2005
Water Balance Way-of-Thinking Championed by Water Sustainability Committee
The 3-day Okanagan Conference organized by the Canadian Water Resources Association (CWRA) in February 2005 was the kick-off event for a sustained education process under the umbrella of the Water Sustainability Action Plan for British Columbia. The process, branded as Convening for Action in British Columbia, is designed to broaden the province-wide base for this shared vision:
In a fully integrated landscape, water is the unifying element.
Hosted by the City of Kelowna, the CWRA Conference was designed to be a transformational event that would be the catalyst for change. The call for action was spelled out in the conference theme: “Water – Our Limiting Resource” – Towards Sustainable Water Management in the Okanagan.
Convening for Action in British Columbia
“In the spirit of inter-association collaboration, the Water Sustainability Committee of the British Columbia Water & Waste Association (BCWWA) provided the core content for Day Three. This positioning fitted well with our convening for action mantra: What / So What / Now What. Our team of Oliver Brandes, Lynn Kriwoken and Kim Stephens provided the Now What part of the program,” reports Ray Fung, WSC Chair.
The “now what do we do” perspective by the WSC convening for action team comprised two companion papers:
- To download the paper by Lynn Kriwoken and Oliver Brandes, click on Changing Perspectives – Changing Paradigms: Demand management strategies and innovative solutions for a sustainable Okanagan water future – This paper provided the big picture and explained the concept of a water management continuum: from the supply-side, through the demand-side to the soft path. Moving beyond simply doing the same with less water, the ‘soft path’ seeks to build resiliency.
- To download the paper by Kim Stephens et al, click on Water Balance Management in the Okanagan: Now What Do We Do? – This paper built on the first paper by laying out the concept for an Okanagan Water Balance Strategy and introducing the following equation to guide the integration of water management with land development: Water OUT = Water IN!
Read together, these two papers articulate the philosophy that underpins and is guiding the Convening for Action (CFA) initiative.
To Learn More:
To read the complete story about the Kelowna presentations, click on Convening for Action Initiative Launched at Okanagan Conference on the Future for Water..
