Civil society organisations have laid out their vision of how a UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) on water and sanitation can be achieved thanks to an event organised by the Geneva Environment Network (GEN).

SDG six agreed on by UN member states in September calls on countries to ensure the availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all. Yet during the GEN event, participants heard that according to the World Bank 20-40% of funds spent addressing the issue are lost due to a lack of integrity.

The conference took place on 23 November and was chaired by Moez Allaoui, Senior Legal Desk Officer at Waterlex, which fights to improve water governance worldwide.

Water should not be a resource for profit, pleasure and convenience, said Maude Barlow, a 2005 Right Livelihood Award Laureate from Canada during the roundtable, which was titled ‘Securing water: Approaches and perspectives from civil society’.

Indeed, the resource should be allocated to where it is crucial for human rights - such as for agriculture and aquifer systems - as a priority, said Lifeng Li, Freshwater Director at WWF International . Without these “we cannot talk about development,” he underlined.

The right to water must be thought of in connection with other goals such as on ending poverty and clean energy, stressed Maria Tignino, Senior Lecturer and Coordinator of the Platform for International Water at the University of Geneva.

Meanwhile, Jumanda Gakelebone - a 2005 Right Livelihood Award Laureate from Botswana – underlined that indigenous peoples are particularly vulnerable to water scarcity and that this is being exacerbated by climate change.

In the subsequent discussion, panel members underlined the role civil society can play in ensuring all have access to information on water and human rights.

For more information please write to diana.rizzolio@unep.org