Fresh Water

© Istockphoto.com / WWF-Canada Shared water challenges in agriculture Few places on Earth illustrate shared water challenges and water risk like California’s Central Valley. The fertile valley, endowed with extensive groundwater supplies, also harnesses the snowpack and rivers of the Sierra Nevada mountains, and combines with extensive sunshine to create one of the most important […]

Umul Baneen is a hard-working woman from Maqboolabad, a rural town in the heart of Punjab in Pakistan’s cotton-growing region. I had the pleasure to meet her and her husband, and hear their story as part of my work as coordinator for WWF’s Sustainable Cotton Initiative. This work aims to improve the lives and livelihoods […]

Last year it was announced that Anheuser-Busch InBev (the world’s largest beer company) would purchase SABMiller (the second largest) for US$106 billion. The company that emerges from this takeover – once brands are sold off and regulatory commissions give the OK – will not only amount to the largest beverage company, but also the most […]

My country, Zambia, doesn’t make international news very often. But recently, from The New York Times, to Al Jazeera to Bloomberg, Zambia is in the headlines. Once the fastest growing economy in Africa, Zambia’s economic growth projections have now been halved. Businesses and communities are suffering, and the government has now reached out to the […]

Sometimes it takes a coincidence of the calendar to help us see the obvious connections in nature. 21 March is International Day of Forests and 22 March is World Water Day, which prompted WWF’s leading freshie (Lifeng Li, director of our global freshwater programme) and head tree hugger (Rod Taylor, director of our global forest […]

Strange as it may appear, I cannot hide my excitement to read in the World Economic Forum’s 2016 global risk report the great emphasis on the risks posed by climate change. Quoting WEF, the top finding is “the potential for climate change to exacerbate water crises, with impacts including conflict and more forced migration, calling […]

I work to protect fresh water, but the reality is, I don’t get my feet wet as often as I’d like. But there are days when I get to leave the desk and computer behind, and remember why I’m in this fight. Last week I had one of those days, as I cheered the athletes at […]

My name is Denis Pozzebon, and I am a second-generation cane farmer in the Burdekin. In 1954, my father emigrated from Italy. He had nothing in his pocket. (He always tells me that story.) When dad made it up to Queensland, he went off to cut cane by hand. He did that for a few […]

For those of us who work on water, yesterday was a big day. The World Economic Forum released the results of its 2015 global risk survey, and guess what tops the list for potential impact? Water crises. In a perverse way, I greeted this news with enthusiasm. And I wasn’t alone. My network of water […]

Global fresh water protection: big dreams, deliberations and celebrations It’s Monday, and World Water Week in Stockholm is in full swing. The conference venue’s café buzzes with conversation. Experts from around the world have gathered to discuss one of our most precious shared natural resources: fresh water. Together, they share ideas and hatch plans for […]