INTERVIEW OPPORTUNITY
Professor Benedito Braga
President of the World Water Council
&
Secretary of State for Sanitation and Water Resources of the State of São Paulo, Brazil.
Stockholm, Sweden: Sunday 28th August– Friday 2nd September 2016
Professor Benedito Braga, President of the World Water Council (WWC) will be available for one on one media interviews from the World Water Week in Stockholm, Sweden from Sunday 28th August to Friday 2nd September 2016.
The World Water Council is a leading organization focusing on the political dimensions of water security, adaptation, and sustainability, working to position water at the top of the global political agenda. Its mission is to mobilize action at all levels by engaging people in debate and challenging conventional thinking.
Some of topics that Professor Braga will be able to discuss with media representatives include:
- Climate Change and water security: Climate change is a daunting challenge that poses major risks to our economies, societies, and ecosystems. These risks include: damage to coastal infrastructure, shifting patterns of infectious diseases, and loss of food security. Responding to these risks and the impacts of climate variability requires measures to increase resilience and capacity to adapt to the impacts that occur, along with long term measures in the energy sector. The World Water Council advocates that the strong connection between climate change and water requires water to be included in the COP agenda, now missing.
- Disaster Risk Reduction (Prevention, Preparedness and Policy): Water infrastructure and management play a central role in reducing the risks of natural disasters. Water storage and infrastructure are vital to combating the effects of drought as well as flooding. Despite of the examples coming from developed countries in this area, natural disasters continue to impact the less developed world. Every year 100 to 200 million people are victims of floods, droughts and other water-related disasters.
- Growing cities, growing challenges: Cities are faced with critical drivers: population growth, changing consumption patterns and uncertain changes in climate variability. In concert these drivers could lead to reduced water security, increased flood vulnerability, and more degraded and stressed natural systems. However, as the pace of urbanization increases cities will continue to be at the forefront of economic growth, and will consequently draw ever-growing levels of investment in infrastructure and services. Now, and even more so in the future, cities will have to interact much more with the hydrological cycle to provide the water security essential for sustained economic prosperity.
- Financing water infrastructure: Economic development, finance, and investment are issues that are of keen interest to political audiences at all levels, from government ministers to local mayors. In the face of current challenges we are simply not doing nor investing enough. The World Water Council is committed to scaling up solutions, increasing investment, and adapting to more rapidly changing circumstances.
- Water and food security: President Braga believes that agriculture has to follow the path of sustainability and not the one of immediate profitability. WWC calls for government policies and investments by the public and private sectors to ensure that crops, livestock and fish are sustainably produced in ways also aimed at safeguarding water resources. Such actions are essential in order to reduce poverty, increase incomes and ensure food security for many people living in rural and urban areas. Food and water security are inextricably linked. WWC believes that by developing local approaches and making the right investments, world leaders can ensure that there will sufficient water volume, quality and access to meet food security in 2050 and beyond. The essence of the challenge is to adopt programs that involve investments in longer-term returns, such as the rehabilitation of infrastructure.
ABOUT PROFESSOR BENEDITO BRAGA
President – World Water Council
Secretary of State for Sanitation and Water Resources of the State of São Paulo, Brazil.
Prof. Benedito Braga is a professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Escola Politecnica of University of São Paulo, Brazil. He holds a Ph.D. in water resources from Stanford University and is an Honorary Diplomate of the American Academy of Water Resources Engineers. He is the author of more than 200 papers and 25 books and chapters of books published internationally. Braga was member of the Board of Directors of the Brazilian National Water Agency (2000 – 2009). President of the Intergovernmental Council of International Hydrologic Program of UNESCO (2004-2005). He chaired the International Steering Committee of the 6th World Water Forum held in Marseille, France. He was the President of the International Water Resources Association (1998- 2000). He is the President of World Water Council responsible for the organization of the World Water Forums since 2012 and Secretary of State for Sanitation and Water Resources of the State of São Paulo, Brazil.
Prof. Braga is fluent in English, Portuguese and Spanish.
FACTS AND FIGURES ABOUT WATER
Water is key to all aspects of development: food security, health, and poverty reduction, as well as sustaining economic growth in agriculture, industry, and energy generation. However, water is seen as a low political priority, receives inadequate funding, and is invariably absent from economic development plans.
Water is a vital resource for which there is no substitute. In the vast majority of countries it is a public good. It is also an economic resource that produces local and global benefits; a social resource that is key to our wellbeing; and a cultural resource that nurtures our spirit. Its availability varies in time and space, it has both productive and destructive impacts, and it is a resource that moves around our planet constantly with no regard for man-made borders.
Water is at the nexus of energy, food and health; and water is the key to help humans adapt to most of the impacts of climate change. This unique and irreplaceable resource must be shared between many uses and users, each of whom wants security today. At the same time it must be managed sustainably, within its finite limits, to ensure water security tomorrow and to increase resilience of communities to water related disasters. If we are to achieve security, sustainability, and resilience we have a shared responsibility to adapt approaches to water management to meet often changing social needs. Cross sector approaches are needed to address the opportunities and threats relating to water security and sustainability in the context of global change, rapid urbanization, and burgeoning consumer demand. Many complex processes are involved, and consistency and long-term commitment is needed in order to succeed.
Success requires fundamental changes in values, beliefs, perceptions, and political positions, not just among water management institutions, but most importantly at the highest political level.
- Globally 884 million people (one in eight) live without safe drinking water and 2.6 billion (two in five) do not have adequate sanitation
- 70% of all freshwater withdrawals are for irrigation and yet 870 million people suffer from chronic hunger
- By 2050 food demand will increase by 60% and energy by 100% if current trends continue
- 80% of the world’s wastewater flows untreated into the environment
- 5 million people die prematurely each year from water-related diseases
- US$2.5 trillion economic losses from disasters so far this century – 70% relate to floods and droughts
- More than 250 internationally shared watercourses contribute to the economic, social, and environmental well-being of 70 percent of the world’s population
- In 2015 water was ranked as the highest risk impacting global society by the World Economic Forum
- The costs of climate change were estimated to total nearly one percent of global GDP in 2010, or nearly $700 billion and this is expected to double by 2030
- New urban development between 2010 and 2030 is expected to equal what was built in all of human history
- More than 1.3 billion people lack access to affordable, reliable electricity. At the same time, energy subsidies cost a staggering $2 trillion, when factoring in externalities
- Over 1 billion people already face water scarcity, and this may triple by 2025
- The global middle class will expand from 2 billion people today to 5 billion in 2030, fundamentally altering consumption patterns
ABOUT THE WORLD WATER COUNCIL
The World Water Council is an international multi-stakeholder platform organization, the founder and co-organizer of the World Water Forum. The World Water Council’s mission is to mobilize action on critical water issues at all levels, including the highest decision-making level, by engaging people in debate and challenging conventional thinking. The Council focuses on the political dimensions of water security, adaptation, and sustainability, and works to position water at the top of the global political agenda. Headquartered in Marseille, France, and created in 1996, the World Water Council brings together almost 350 member organizations from more than 50 different countries.
For more information visit: www.worldwatercouncil.org/
