The United Nations World Water Development Report 2020

The United Nations World Water Development Report 2020
Author: UNESCO
Publisher:
Total Pages: 234
Release: 2020-03-27
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9210050002

The 2020 edition of the WWDR, titled Water and Climate Change illustrates the critical linkages between water and climate change in the context of the broader sustainable development agenda. Supported by examples from across the world, it describes both the challenges and opportunities created by climate change, and provides potential responses – in terms of adaptation, mitigation and improved resilience – that can be undertaken by enhancing water resources management, attenuating water-related risks, and improving access to water supply and sanitation services for all in a sustainable manner. It addresses the interrelations between water, people, environment and economics in a changing climate, demonstrating how climate change can be a positive catalyst for improved water management, governance and financing to achieve a sustainable and prosperous world for all. The report provides a fact-based, water-focused contribution to the knowledge base on climate change. It is complementary to existing scientific assessments and designed to support international political frameworks, with the goals of helping the water community tackle the challenges of climate change, and informing the climate change community about the opportunities that improved water management offers in terms of adaptation and mitigation.

Sustainable Development of Water and Environment

Sustainable Development of Water and Environment
Author: Rong Sun
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 237
Release: 2019-05-30
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 3030167291

This book covers the full spectrum of water and environment conservation, offering management lessons, identifying the barriers to transformative change, and then presenting agendas and initiatives for sustainable global water and environment management. Water is a unique resource and is vital to human beings and ecosystems. At the same time, it is a driver of growth and development. However, in a changing world factors such as rapid population growth and urbanization are having an increasing impact on water and the environment, and managing critical water resources sustainably represents an unprecedented and urgent challenge. As such, the book describes innovative approaches that can be used to support the operationalization and delivery of sustainable water and environment management. ICSDWE 2019 is dedicated to sustainable water and environment, with a focus on the water resources management, wastewater treatment and environmental protection. Sharing current knowledge and recent developments, experiences and lessons learned, it stimulates discussion and reflection, to promote a paradigm shift toward sustainable water and environment management.

Dams and Development

Dams and Development
Author: Sanjeev Khagram
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Total Pages: 287
Release: 2018-08-06
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1501727397

Big dams built for irrigation, power, water supply, and other purposes were among the most potent symbols of economic development for much of the twentieth century. Of late they have become a lightning rod for challenges to this vision of development as something planned by elites with scant regard for environmental and social consequences—especially for the populations that are displaced as their homelands are flooded. In this book, Sanjeev Khagram traces changes in our ideas of what constitutes appropriate development through the shifting transnational dynamics of big dam construction. Khagram tells the story of a growing, but contentious, world society that features novel and increasingly efficacious norms of appropriate behavior in such areas as human rights and environmental protection. The transnational coalitions and networks led by nongovernmental groups that espouse such norms may seem weak in comparison with states, corporations, and such international agencies as the World Bank. Yet they became progressively more effective at altering the policies and practices of these historically more powerful actors and organizations from the 1970s on. Khagram develops these claims in a detailed ethnographic account of the transnational struggles around the Narmada River Valley Dam Projects in central India, a huge complex of thirty large and more than three thousand small dams. He offers further substantiation through a comparative historical analysis of the political economy of big dam projects in India, Brazil, South Africa, and China as well as by examining the changing behavior of international agencies and global companies. The author concludes with a discussion of the World Commission on Dams, an innovative attempt in the late 1990s to generate new norms among conflicting stakeholders.

Water for People, Water for Life

Water for People, Water for Life
Author: World Water Assessment Programme (United Nations)
Publisher: Unesco
Total Pages: 608
Release: 2003
Genre: Water quality management
ISBN:

The world's freshwater resources are coming under growing pressure through such environmental hazards as human waste, urbanization, industrialization, and pesticides. The problems are exacerbated through drought in many parts of the world. The improvement of the water quality itself and access to it have been major concerns for politicians and development agencies for over a decade. First officially formulated at the Rio Earth Summit of 1992, they have been restated or expanded since then. The UN Millennium Declaration of 2000 transformed general guidelines into specific targets. The international community pledged "to halve by 2015 the proportion of people who are unable to reach, or to afford, safe drinking water" and "to stop the unsustainable exploitation of water resources, by developing water management strategies at the regional, national and local levels, which promote both equitable access and adequate supplies." Thus, ten years after Rio it is time to take stock. Based on the collective inputs of 23 United Nations agencies and convention secretariats, this Report offers a global overview of the state of the world's freshwater resources. It is part of an on-going assessment process to develop policies and help with their implementation as well as to measure any progress towards achieving sustainable use of water resources. Generously illustrated with more than 25 full-color global maps and numerous figures, the report reviews progress and trends and presents seven pilot case studies of river basins representing various social, economic and environmental settings: Lake Titicaca (Bolivia, Peru); Senegal river basin (Senegal, Mali, Mauritania, Guinea); Seine Normandy (France); Lake Peipsi/Chudskoe (Estonia, Russia); Ruhuna basin (Sri Lanka); Greater Tokyo region (Japan); and Chao Phraya (Thailand). It assesses progress in 11 challenge areas, including health, food, environment, shared water resources, cities, industry, energy, risk management, knowledge, valuing water and governance. Proposing methodologies and indicators for measuring sustainability, it lays the foundations for regular, system-wide monitoring and reporting by the UN, together with the development of standardized methodologies and data. With its comprehensive maps, glossary, references and coverage of a broad range of themes and examples of real-world river basins, the UN World Water Development Report will no doubt prove to be a most valuable reference work. Visit the United Nation's Water Portal for more information on the report and on the International Year of Freshwater 2003.

A Bucket of Water

A Bucket of Water
Author: Kanayo F. Nwanze
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2017
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9781853399701

A Bucket of Water reflects on the work of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) in tackling challenging issues in rural development, and provides an accessible discussion of themes such as peace and development, the cost of inaction, engaging young people in farming, women's contribution, business, and technology and research.

The United Nations world water development report 2016: water and jobs

The United Nations world water development report 2016: water and jobs
Author: UNESCO
Publisher: UNESCO Publishing
Total Pages: 164
Release: 2016-02-29
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9231001469

The United Nations World Water Assessment Programme (WWAP) is hosted and led by UNESCO. WWAP brings together the work of 31 UN-Water Members as well as 38 Partners to publish The United Nations World Water Development Report (WWDR) series. The annual World Water Development Reports focus on strategic water issues. UN-Water Members and Partners - all experts in their fields - contribute with latest findings on a specific theme. This edition of the World Water Development Report focuses on Water and Jobs and seeks to inform decision-makers, inside and outside the water community, about the importance of the water and jobs nexus for the social and economic development and environmental sustainability of countries, rich and poor. The importance of water for jobs across economies is such that this report could be subtitled No water - No jobs. Indeed, a great majority of jobs are dependent upon water, and therefore increasingly at risk under conditions of water scarcity. T