CSR Press Release

As we wade further into the 21st Century, water is displacing oil as the greatest resource challenge, a dilemma Samuel Coleridge captured in the Rime of the Ancient Mariner. On a warming globe, there's increasingly too little water - think droughts and conflict over water access - or too much, as with hurricanes and rising sea levels. Corporate social responsibility plays a pivotal role in addressing the global water crisis, on the one hand helping solve problems by providing technologies such as cheap water filters, while on the other hand navigating controversy over such issues as water privatization diverting aquifers in India from community to corporate use.

In the US, Hurricane Gustav downgraded into a Tropical Depression before landfall, waylaying fears of another Katrina decimating New Orleans. However, increasingly severe weather events are now a reality, redoubling the need for systemic preparation. Hence this week’s launch of the United Way 2008 Hurricane Recovery Fund, which will address needs created by Gustav as well as hurricanes following on its heals this season, such as Hanna. And business, which played a key role in recovering from Katrina and Rita with over $1.2 billion in cash and in-kind assistance, again stands prepared, with the National Disaster Help Desk activated by the US Chamber of Commerce's Business Civic Leadership Center.

Similar systemic responses to the looming water crisis in Asia will be considered at an upcoming public-private forum hosted by the Maryland-Asia Environmental Partnership. Singapore, which in June hosted an International Water Week, will serve as a "shining example of sustainable water management." The CEO of Singapore's national water agency (PUB) will give a keynote on the country's four-fold solutions of local cachment, imported water, reclaimed water, and desalinated water.

And last month, Stockholm hosted the 18th annual World Water Week, which focused attention on the UN Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of halving the proportion of the population without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation. There, WWF Director-General James Leape called for the implementation of the UN Watercourses Convention, an international agreement that promises water security for almost half the world's population but “has languished in limbo for more than a decade.”

That week also saw the launch of the first annual Aspen Design Challenge, which inspires students to devise solutions for "Designing Water's Future." In addition to on-the ground solutions, the global water crisis demands communications solutions that raise consciousness and promote understanding of the problems. Next generation designers who win the challenge will travel to the World Summit on Climate Change in Copenhagen in December 2009 where the next generation of climate solutions, the successor to the Kyoto Protocol will be negotiated.

This article was written by CSRwire contributor Bill Baue.