The WCC is a fellowship of churches, now 349 in more than 110 countries in all continents from virtually all christian traditions 
Waters of life
An invitation to participate in the Ecumenical Water Network
INTRODUCTION
This text has been agreed by a working group on Water at a WCC consultation at Mission 21, Basel from 9-13 May, 2005.
The WCC represents more than 340 member churches from all around the world with ca. 500 million members. Church related relief and development agencies mobilize around 1 billion US$ every year for emergency relief, development and advocacy. A strong group among them advocates for water as a human right and a common good. Their position is rooted in their day to day efforts to provide freshwater and sanitation to impoverished communities around the world and in disaster and war stricken areas, such as Afghanistan, Iraq and Darfur.
This text refers to fundamental convictions and issues for action and advocacy that are to be shared with a wider group of member churches and ecumenical partners in an emerging ecumenical water network.
Justice, Peace, Creation Team
of the World Council of Churches
May 2005, Geneva/Switzerland
WHAT WE STAND FOR
Water scarcity belongs to the pressing environmental issues of today’s world. Many countries suffer from water shortage. Large numbers of people have no access to water and lack adequate means of sanitation. If present conditions continue to prevail, the situation is bound to become worse in the coming decades.
The Ecumenical Water Network was formed by Christian agencies and movements:
- to make a Christian witness heard in the present debate on water issues,
- to raise the awareness of the churches on the urgency of the concern,
- to engage as an ecumenical community in common action at all levels
- with the aim to promote the preservation, responsible management and the equitable distribution of water for all, based on the understanding that water is a gift of God and a fundamental human right.
What are the reasons for the present crisis?
Many factors are responsible. To mention but a few: increased and unsustainable agricultural and industrial use of water, deforestation and land-degradation that seriously change the water cycle, over-consumption and waste, pollution and population growth. But the crisis is aggravated by the prevailing economic system. Public and community control of water supply has drastically diminished over recent decades and years. Increasingly water is treated as a commercial good subject to market conditions. Many cases can be cited where privatisation of water resources has deprived the poor from access to water.
Fundamental convictions
As the churches engage in debate and action on water issues, they are guided by the following convictions:
Water is the condition of all life on the planet – plants, animals and human beings. Water is an essential gift of God for all living beings. Water resources must, therefore, be protected for the whole of creation. Human beings are part of the creation. Human society can only exist within the bio-system; its survival depends on the survival of the whole. The care for the whole of creation must be the basis for the churches’ engagement and action.
As far as human society is concerned, our starting point is that the access to water is a fundamental human right. It is a matter of justice and of social and political sustainability of any society, that it must be ordered in such a way that all people can benefit from the gift of water. This requires:
- to establish the right to water for all people in a binding manner,
- to guarantee the right to water for coming generations,
- to protect the local and national water rights of Indigenous Peoples under international law,
- to guarantee women’s water-related rights as human rights.
c) The sustainable use and human management of natural resources as forest, wetland, grassland and agricultural l and is of utmost importance for the long term availability of water. Necessary for all life, water must be treated in a careful and sustainable manner. Fresh water is scarce. Only 0.008% of the planets water is available for consumption. Water should not be over-used or polluted. Water must be used efficiently - for agricultural, industrial as well as for domestic use. We have to manage our water resources by keeping environmental and economic development in balance, by learning from good examples in the world, and adapting them to local conditions.This requires:
- to protect water resources and catchment areas,
- to carefully monitor water supply systems,
- to re-circulate water,
- to support local communities in their efforts for responsible use of water.
d) The protection and control of water resources is a central public responsibility. Water being a condition of life, water supply must be managed through structures representing all sectors of the population. Churches will call for comprehensive plans and measures to protect the availability of water. The recognition of the basic role of water for all life and human survival and health needs to be enshrined in national constitutions. States have the responsibility to create within their territory the best possible water conditions for all. This responsibility includes the protection of aquifers, measure against pollution and salinisation, afforestation etc. Public authorities are responsible for the adequate supply and the equitable distribution of water. This requires:
- to declare as a core task of governments to guarantee the right to water and to make nation-states and their authorities responsible for the respect, protection and optimal and ongoing fulfilment of the right to water.
e) Water must not be treated as a commercial good or a commodity of trade. Water being an essential good for life, should not be subject to the rules of profit making.
It must be ensured that there are affordable pricing systems under public accountability. The costs to consumers should be re-directed to the benefit of the community rather than for private profit.
Water increasingly being a scarce good, must be used sparingly. Water must be placed under public responsibility to guarantee the access to water for all including the impoverished sectors of society without purchasing power. This requires:
- to protect water as a public good belonging to humanity and all life,
- to prevent water from being commodified and degraded to a tradable good,
- to ensure that the human right to water takes precedence over international trade policies; in particular water should be excluded from all bilateral and multilateral trade and investment agreements
f) At all levels public administration of water must be transparent, i.e. open to control by the people. This requires:
- to provide all people both internationally and domestically with effective judicial remedies for demanding fulfilment of the right to water.
g) To the largest degree possible responsibility for the management and distribution of water should be placed in the hands of the communities depending on it. The principle of subsidiarity is essential for the maintenance and protection of water resources. Churches and church agencies will therefore consistently support and encourage the control of water resources by local communities. This requires:
- to ensure that the people have a democratic right in determining and deciding national and local water strategies.
- to protect the local and national water rights of Indigenous Peoples under national and international law.
h) Water issues transcend in many ways national borders. Solutions can only be found through international solidarity. Since water issues transcend regional and national boundaries, nations will require regional and international legal frameworks and agreements to ensure concerted common action. Churches will promote mutual understanding and common action by the community of nations. As water becomes scarce, it can easily become a source of conflict. To preserve water resources, conflict prevention is essential.
Theological and ethical basis
a) Water - the cradle and source of life:
Water is the cradle and source of life, and one of the most potent bearers of cultural and religious meanings. Life, in all its forms is impossible without water. It was only the development of planetary conditions that allowed for the presence of large quantities of water in its liquid state that made possible the emergence of life on earth. Without water and its particular qualities, biological life as we know it would be impossible.
b) Water – well of health
Water is both an external and internal feature of life on God’s Earth. Over 80% of our bodies comprises of H2O, The same is true of most other living organisms. Our metabolisms function by the flow of fluids.
We are held in water before our birth. We express some of our feelings through tears and perspiration. Water is central to our diet and balance. Some of us struggle from dehydration, whilst others suffer from excess water in our body-weight.
c) Water - God’s gift for all living beings:
In Christian theological reflection, Creation begins with the Spirit of God “brooding over the face of the waters” (Genesis 1:2). God, the creator, is the giver of life, and water is so to say the instrument through which God creates. Gifts remind us of the giver. They have their value because of the relationship to the giver and the giver’s presence in them. Gifts must be respected. The giver is honoured by sharing the gift with all, and passing it on to future generations.
d)Water – scarce and over-abundant
It is possible for the waters of life rapidly to become the waters of death. Waves, tides and rains can bring destruction instead of vitality.
In the Biblical texts water is seen both as a necessity to life, but also as a threat under the conditions of a world suffering from the consequences of sin. Drought becomes a symbol and image of divine judgement (Isaiah 33:9). Water scarcity endangers life. Communities experience threat not only because of desertification and drought but also through devastating floods, sea level rise or water pollution as a result of inadequate sanitation. The eschatological hope of the prophets comes to be expressed through the promise that rivers will spring up in the desert (Isaiah 43:19). The river of life is the final vision of the Book of Revelation (Rev. 22: 1-7) and the life-threatening sea will be no more when there will be a new heaven and a new earth (Rev. 21:1).
e) Waters of life:
For the Christian community water becomes the image of renewal, of promise, and of hope in baptism. Water has a deep spiritual meaning.
In the scriptures we see the identification of particular cultures with the rivers from which their sustenance is drawn. Human community is dependent on water, not just physically, but socially and culturally. When the people “refuse the gentle waters of Shiloah” (Isaiah 8:6), we are being told that they have forgotten their divine vocation. The consequence of this is a judgement lived out in exile beside the wrong river (Ps 137). This correlation between culture and the water systems beside which people live, and in relationship to which they gain their livelihood, provides a basis for the church's solidarity with Indigenous Peoples, and indeed, with all peoples who are displaced from their home and alienated from the waters that have traditionally given them life.
f) Water requires human responsibility
We are called to use God’s gift of water in gratitude and for the common good of all life on planet earth. This call involves human responsibility in caring for the neighbour and for all life in order to ensure as a matter of justice that nobody is denied water, the foundation of life.
In other words: The centrality of water to life, and the experience of water as gift are two sources of the affirmation of water as a basic human right. Just as the biblical Jubilee declared that land belonged, in the final analysis, to God and not to any particular individual, so water should be part of the global commons and a social good.
To treat water as a gift of God and human right implies that clean fresh water should be available to meet the basic needs of all living beings, rather than be treated as a private commodity to be bought and sold.
Issues for advocacy and action
The fundamental convictions stated above need to be promoted at all levels of society. They imply:
a) Placing water issues on the agenda of the churches,
inviting them to assess the situation in their own country as well as the response of their government to water issues, urging them to articulate their position in the light of theological and ethical basis and the fundamental convictions , and calling them to advocate for the right to water for all and to promote public measures for protecting water resources against over-consumption and pollution.
b) Supporting community-based initiatives
taking sides with people – often marginalised – who tend to be excluded from water supply, e.g. in slum areas or remote rural villages and strengthening initiatives of local communities to exercise control over the management of their water resources; establishing a network among such “communities of hope”.
c) Addressing trade and privatisation concerns
co-operating with local, national and international movements defending access to water as a human right in negotiations on trade agreements at all levels and participating in the present debate on the relationship of the public and private sectors. The concern for the maintenance of transparent and efficient public control must consistently be pursued, e.g. at the level of UN CSD but also at the national and regional levels.
d) Advocating sufficient support to and funding of water
projects
regarding Official Development Aid (ODA) targets (0,7% of the Gross Domestic Product and 15% share of aid to water and sanitation) and the priorities in the programmes and projects of relief and development agencies.
e) Participating on the basis of the fundamental convictions
in the UN Decade on Water 2005-2015 and in the efforts towards binding legal instruments for the implementation of the right to water and the protection of water as a public good at the level of the UN.
Signs of hope
The following examples are noted as inspirational good practice of church engagement with water issues across the world:
a) Healing nature in India with community spirit and efforts
In the heart of Andhra Pradesh, a state of India with wide dry areas, lies the region of "Rayalaseema", the Land of Stones. Visitors often can not believe what their eyes see, when they come near to the working area of KRUSHI, an NGO working with indigenous and Dalit people in the state since many years - they see fresh green hills from top to the down lying areas in midst of deforestated, dry and stony mountains. In this area, the rain comes down during few months, often coming not at all, which regularly causes starving periods and generates temporary migration of the local people. Also, the ecological degradation is dramatic and every monsun season brings more soil erosion. In this challenging situation, KRUSHI together with other local NGO and with the support of the German protestant development organisation Bread for the World, generated a community based model for the ecological recuperation of small local watershed areas. It is a model which is based on local peopleÿs knowledge and commitment, giving special attention to the active involvement of women.
The methodology includes various steps and phases and local people play the protagonic role right from the first moment. For example KRUSHI helps to draw simple maps which show where along to the observancy of local people, normally the water takes its way running down the deforestated hills. Guided by these community wisdom based maps, in the next phase people build smaller and larger constructions from top of the hill downwards, in order to detain and to slow the flow of the monsun rain waters, and to allow it to enter into the ground. These construction work is supported by planting local trees and plants which will help the water to find its way into the ground, and to withhold the soil and accumulate it again on the hills. It was the womenÿs idea and insistance to grow those plants and trees which besides their effect against erosion, offer fruits for the familiesÿ diet and fire wood for the community.
After three years, the changes started to become evident. The Land of Stones first had green parches, and now has green areas. The poor Dalit people in the involved communities succeeded not only to maintain and to improve, but also to enlarge their small pieces of land. The families gain more products from their land for their own consumption and for the local market. Basical condition for these improvements was to heal the hills and to give them back their capacity to receive and to withhold the seasonal rain and channel it into the groundwater stocks. Because there is no "blue water" without taking care for the "green water", as a traditional saying says. In this way, community wisdom and community engagement, with solidary accompaniment by KRUSHI succeeded - at a low cost - to make the local wells give water during the whole year, and to set ground for a promising future for the Dalit families nowadays and for the future generations.
b) Uruguayan people change constitution for the human right to water
October 31 of 2004 became a historical day for Uruguay and the global water movement, when more than 60% of the Uruguayan people supported the Constitutional Reform in Defense of Water, adding water as a human right to the Constitution and setting the basis for its excluisve public, participative and sustainable management.
This referendum resource was promoted by the National Commission in Defense of Water and Life (CNDAV) . The commission was created in 2002 as an answer to the signing of a Letter of Intent between the Uruguayan government and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which committed to extend the privatization of potable water and sanitation services to the entire country. Privatizations started in Maldonado department, firstly with the presence of French multinational company Suez Lyonnaise followed by Spanish company Aguas de Bilbao. As in most cases of water privatizations performed during last years, these processes have had negative consequences.
From the social point of view, wide sectors were prevented access to potable water for not being able to afford the cost of the service, which considerably decreased its quality with respect to the services granted by water state company OSE. The conditions of the service were of such low quality that quality control bodies in that matter recommended not to consume water because it didn't comply with minimum quality standards.
The victory of the water plebiscite was actually a social one. CNDAV is a wide group of social and political organizations which oppose a merchandising conception of water. Among their founders are neighbors' organizations, FFOSE (water state company's trade union) and REDES-FOE (Friends of the Earth Uruguay).
However, despite its political support, the water plebiscite was secondary within the politic and media agenda. In addition to this, privatizing companies, of water and other sectors (as bottling companies) as well as conservative business sectors (large estate owners, forestal and rice) carried out a strong politic and media lobby against the reform.
During the nine months previous to the campaign, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) started a public debate with the CNDAV, denying any imposition to the Uruguayan government and refusing the responsibility attributed to the content of 2002 Intentions Letter. The work, which enabled the triumph of the Constitutional Reform , was based on the grassroots, which transmitted the spirit and content of the proposed articles.
The auspicious result of the plebiscite opens the doors for a water policy designed from a vision of this particular resource as a common good, to be publicly managed on social participation and sustainability criteria. The outcome of the plebiscit also proves the viability and potential of popular efforts and alliances in defense and protection of social common goods. It was an inspiring sign of hope for the international community of defenders of the human right to water.
c) Making a garden of Eden wherever you live – Self-Group in Kenya
Recently I was happy to attend a Workshop by the Lutheran World Federation in which one of the leaders of Utooni Self-Help Community Group was participating. During one of the meditation sessions, the Moderator invited the participants to voluteer a song. Esther, the leader from Utooni, rose and taught us a song. The words are very moving:
Rather than dream of going to Heaven',
Wake up and make a Garden of Eden,
Make wherever you are a Heaven
God will bless you as you do!
Utooni Self-help Community Group in Eastern Kenya was formed in 1978 and registered with the Ministry of Culture and Social Services in 1982. It was made up of 135 families, with a total population of about 1000 persons of varying ages. Not all members of the administrative division became members. The registered Group consisted of only the families whose leaders were convinced that they need to cooperate to improve their economy and their environment. Their leader and facilitator was, and continues to be Joshua Mukusya, a committed Christian who worked in the Rural Development Department of the National Council of Churches of Kenya and with several agricultural companies before he quit and went home to help his mother and the rest of the community. Since 1978 he lives with them, plans with them, and implements with them the plans they agree upon.
The Utooni Self-Help Community Group operates about thirty km south of Machakos, and about ninety km south east of Nairobi. Their local market is at Kola. Thirty years ago this area was almost completely bare, having been stripped of trees by carvers who cut them for making curios for the tourist industry. The area has no permanent river, but has many valleys covered with plenty of sand and rough stones. The area is semi-arid, with very little rainfall per year. The Group formed nine committees to deal with the various challenges they faced: water-harvesting; food; schooling; health; investment; security; culture; afforestation; soil conservation. Each committee would plan for activities and share the plans with the rest of members for approval and implementation. Women are the majority in the committees and in daily operations of the Group. Even the artisans leading construction work are mainly women. The men participate, but they acknowledge the leadership of the women who have been elected because of competence and leadership qualities.
Every Monday each member-family sends a representative to work together with the others on a project earlier agreed upon. they work on each others farms and homes in turn once every week. This has been done since 1982. In monetary terms, the cost of this labour is worth millions of dollars. The result of this investment is there for any visitor to see. There are beautiful terraces, which conserve the soil and retain moisture on the slopes which have now been rehabilitated into fertile farms. In addition, forty-two kilometers of terraces have been made. More than 200 sand dams have been built, serviing as reservoirs for millions of liters of rain-harvested water. More than 8,500 domestic water tanks have been constructed, so that every member family has at least one tank. Some of the tanks have been built for schools and other institutions. The Group has been invited by other communities to extend its expertise to them, and now many more dams are being constructed in other areas.
Friday is the market day at Kola, when the community members meet to exchange the fruits of their labour. Sellers and buyers come from elsewhere to trade, bringing goods which are not locally produced. It is interesting to observe the growing commerce that is evolving at Kola as the economic output continues to expand and becomes more and more sophisticated. Water consumption per family has continued to rise as the community harvests more rainwater. Thus the standard of living continues to rise. There is more brick-making, both for local use and for sale. This is possible because of the trees which have been planted to provide timber and fuel and for other uses.
The Community has also hosted several groups who visit them to learn. Normally, visitors are encouraged to join the Group members as they work, and to contribute some of the materials (such as cement and reinforcement steel) in appreciation of the hospitality. The local market at Kola has become a little neat town, whose main investors are the members of this Group. They have a housing scheme at the town, where they have constucted rental houses for civil servants and other tenants. There is a Post Office, which also serves as their bank. Recently, an all-weather road has been built passing though the town. This road brings more customers and visitors to Kola.
These paragraphs describe a very interesting lesson about the process of social reconstruction and economic development. The community is in control of its own present and future. Other actors have to meet the community on its own terms - including politicians, NGO, administrators and religious leaders. In the long term, this is a sustainable community, because it has set its own priorities, which it implements using its own labour and resources. If some help comes from outside, the members appreciate, but they do not wait for help in order to implement their plans. They go on as if there is noone to rely upon except God and themselves. Their Motto is: 'Without Vision We Perish.' Their investments are built to last, and when the Group members work, they know they are doing it not only for themselves, but for posterity.
Hopefully, this approach will eventually become normative among those of us who are persuaded that economic development can best be achieved by the people themselves at local levels, not by impersonal institutions imposing themselves from the top. E.F. Schumacher's dictum seems to have been proved right by the Utooni Self-help Community Group. His insights are contained in his book titled 'Small is Beautiful - Economics as if People Mattered' (London: Abacus, 1973). Macro-economic indicators of growth are misleading, if the gap between the affluent and the destitute continues to widen. As Professor Charles Birch used to say in the 1970s, the gap can be reduced 'only if the rich can live more simply, so that the poor may simply live.' The problem of poverty and affluence is primarily a question of Ethics and Spirituality, rather than Politics and Economics.
I wish the leaders of this world, who are now obsessed with 'globalization' would heed the wisdom of the people of Kola: 'Without Vision We Perish'.
The Ecumenical Water Network holds its Inaugural Conference 6-13 November 2005 at Machakos, Kenya. The participants will have the opportunity to be guest co-workers with the Utooni Self-Help Community Group onWednesday, 9th November.
Links
Useful reading:
Barlow, Maude and Clarke, Tony. Blue Gold: The Battle Against Corporate Theft of the World’s Water. Toronto: Stoddart, 2002.
Jubilee South (www.jubileesouth.org)
Shiva, Vandana, Water Wars, Cambridge: South End Press, 2002
The Blue Planet Project (www.blueplanetproject.net)
The Water Barons: http://www.publicintegrity.org/water/
United Nations: Water for People, Water for Life: http://www.unesco.org/water/wwap/wwdr/table_contents.shtml
Websites of partner organisations
Water Campaign – Brot für die Welt
http://www.menschen-recht-wasser.de/index.php
Church World Service series on water
http://www.churchworldservice.org/pdf_files/E&A/water2.pdf
European Christian Environmental Network
http://www.ecen.org/ecenhome.shtml
KAIROS Canada
http://www.kairoscanada.org/e/ecology/water/index.asp
Norwegian Church Aid
http://english.nca.no
Church of Sweden
http://www.Svenskakyrkan.se/