What is our dependence on water?
What does water do for us?
How do we share this resource?
What other analogies do we take from these discussions?
How is water a metaphor for the interconnection of global economies, religions, states, and privileges?
Where does water connect us?
These questions are taken from a blog post: The Young Ecologist: Lesson Plans for Building Earth Democracy, with Dr. Vandana Shiva and Shreya Jani – an enlightening post which gives clear instructions for considering water not to be a commodity – but a commons – that is not something that can be bought and sold and exploited but something that is a common property – a common right – to be shared – to be honoured and protected.
Let us ask and answer these questions together for as we see today from a recent study by the Californian Institute of Technology, our world water supplies are dwindling and being overused and under restored.
Groundwater storage trends for Earth’s 37 largest aquifers from UCI-led study using NASA GRACE data (2003 – 2013). Of these, 21 have exceeded sustainability tipping points and are being depleted, with 13 considered significantly distressed, threatening regional water security and resilience. Image Credit: UC Irvine/NASA/JPL-Caltech
As Dr Shiva and Shreya Jani suggest we must educate our young people as youth under 25 now represent nearly half the global population and they must be active in the preparation of our common future.
As I look at the Google Earth map of the Tirzada are where we have built our first check dam for water harvesting we see many wells. But these wells are on individual’s land – these wells are considered to be the property of the farmer on who’s land they exist.
The water however is common – it runs beneath the land and collects in the well. For us all to survive we must become aware that water is our common wealth – it must be shared – generosity of spirit must extend to the life blood of our land.
When we honour the water, respect it and share it – it will flow and replenish rather than as money held tight in the fist, it diminishes and becomes polluted.
