We all agree that steps must be taken quickly to avert a water crisis. But where to start? The World Water Vision project aims to be a first step. Its main task is to develop a widely shared vision of the specific actions needed to achieve a common set of water-related goals as 2025 approaches. However, a vision cannot exist without concrete ideas for translating it into reality: this is why a Framework for Action is being created.
The Vision and the Framework for Action will be presented at the Second World Water Forum in The Hague. This will be a first step in a long-term process of change. The Forum's immediate objectives, public awareness and political commitment, are essential for initiating this change. The process is ongoing and we invite readers to contribute to it.
World Water Vision
Thousands of people around the world have participated in over a hundred international workshops and countless national meetings to develop their vision for sustainable water use in the next century. Midterm results were assessed in Stockholm in August 1999. At the same time, plans were made to continue pursuing an even wider participation of stakeholders and a deepened vision. The outcome of this process will be presented to the world at the Second World Water Forum & Ministerial Conference on World Water Day, 22 March 2000, in The Hague.
Framework for Action
From the onset, the intention has been to devise a programme of concrete steps towards ensuring clean water for everyone in the near future. Called the Framework for Action, this programme will pave the way to making the Vision reality in the next century. The full Framework for Action document will be presented in The Hague during the Second World Water Forum and Ministerial Conference. Some components of the strategy will be urgent, requiring immediate implementation; these will be launched at the Forum in The Hague. Others will be developed over the next year or two, and yet others will be part of a longer term, strategic Framework for Action for 2025.
For more information, please visit:
www.watervision.org for the World Water Vision
www.gwpforum.org for Framework for Action
Objectives
Mass Public Awareness
The objectives of the Second World Water Forum are closely related to those of the Vision for Water, Life and the Environment in the 21st Century and the Framework for Action. The Forum will be a platform for the creation of mass public awareness for the Vision and Framework.
Political Commitment
The Forum will generate the political commitment needed to address the looming crisis in water resources. It will be a political call to implement the World Water Vision and the Framework for Action.
