In March 2023, in New York, the United Nations (United Nations Organization) convened the Water Conference, the first and only edition of which took place in 1977. Since then, there has been positive progress in the international water agenda, and its inclusion with specific goals in the set of development goals sustainable development (SDG 6), as well as access to clean and safe water and sanitation, was declared a fundamental human right, through General Assembly resolution 64/292, of 2010.
The official objective of the conference was a mid-term review of the implementation of the goals of the International Decade for Sustainable Water Development, and an assessment of challenges and opportunities, as well as supporting actions that make it possible to ensure the availability and sustainable management of water and water and sanitation for all by 2030.
For this event, representatives of national governments, UN agencies, NGOs, international bodies, civil society entities, the scientific community, private companies, philanthropic foundations, and indigenous and traditional peoples, among other actors, were mobilized. Accredited entities promoted hundreds of events parallel to the official program from March 22 to 24.
Despite such intense mobilization around the world on a topic related to water, an essential commodity for life, the Brazilian media generally ignored the event.
Opening the conference was the Global Water Development Report, produced by UNESCO’s Global Water Assessment Program on behalf of UN-Water, a group of more than 30 United Nations agencies. 1. Under the heading of partnership and cooperation, the document draws attention to Imminent risk of a global water scarcity crisis, due to overconsumption and climate change. Currently, between 2 billion and 3 billion people already experience water shortages for at least one month out of the year. Estimates indicate that the number of people affected by water scarcity in Egypt is increasing Current 933 million to 1.7 to 2.4 billion of people in the year 2050. The document warns of the “dangerous path” that societies are following, “from excessive consumption and the evolution of vampirism.”
Opening the conference was the Global Water Development Report, produced by UNESCO’s Global Water Assessment Program on behalf of UN-Water, a group of more than 30 United Nations agencies.
Although the government was late in organizing participation in the event, it sought to regain a starring role on the international stage, and to discuss voluntary commitments of countries on sustainable water use. Statement João Paulo Capobianco, Executive Secretary of MMA and Head of the Brazilian Delegation, emphasized that ensuring universal access to water and sanitation is linked to the current government’s priorities of “combating poverty and inequality in all its forms.” She advocated for broad social participation and balance between the multiple uses of water, ensuring access Vulnerable populations, indigenous peoples and rural communities need water.
In the Brazilian government delegation formed by representatives of ministries, the National Congress and some states and municipalities, the large delegation of ANA (National Agency for Water and Basic Sanitation), with 11 members, stood out. However, in line with the statements of the head of the delegation, it was noted that the agency is aligned with the neoliberal agenda at the conference, having preferred to communicate with private sector agents and national entities that give it shelter, such as Brazil’s Trata Institute and international analogies. Strictly speaking, a two-faced Brazilian government was noted at the event: one seeks to materialize the election campaign promises of the Lula government and the other remains hostage to the extremist logic of the previous government, responsible for changing the sanitation framework in 2020.
Of the 200 parallel events held, many were sponsored or participated in by Brazilian civil society entities accredited to the conference. We highlight two of these events. The first participation of citizens and society to ensure the rights to water and sanitation through public, public and grassroots partnerships was discussed, bringing together the successful practices of these partnerships in Colombia, Switzerland, Catalonia, Spain and Paris. The second presented the risks to human rights through the privatization of water and sanitation services, with debaters from Brazil, Spain, Indonesia, Senegal and the United Kingdom, with a focus on the pro-renationalization movement for services in England and Wales. two.
The conference was also a venue for dissemination of relevant data. The 19 United Nations Special Rapporteurs, working on various aspects of human rights, have defended the need for water management as a very common Not as a commodity, and for countries to ensure that human rights and water advocates are given a prominent role in water discussions.
More than 600,000 people and 500 organizations around the world have signed up “Water Justice Statement”, to be read in the plenary session of the conference. The text asks all states to prioritize water for life rather than water for profit. In contrast to the commodification perspective of this essential public good, it proposes a plan of action that focuses on direct investments in alternative public and community water supplies and the protection of water ecosystems, arguing that private water management is incompatible with the realization of human rights.
However, it wasn’t just progressive demonstrations that took place at the event. A very influential document – perhaps the most influential of all – called Turning the tide: a call for collective action It is authored by the World Commission on Water Saving. This document presents new ways of approaching the water issue, using innovative concepts and language, and is supposedly based on scientific evidence to frame its “call to action”. However, many have been analyzing that this is the old and shabby neoliberal prescription, disguised in a more modern narrative, to promote public-private partnerships, defend increases in water use prices, and put the importance of regions into the background. When evaluating the so-called “global public good”. This is precisely the danger of the document: based on well-designed formulations, falsely supporting the Action Plan on scientific evidence and endorsed by respected experts on the world stage, legitimizing policies that, after all, promote further exclusion and discrimination.
One positive aspect was the representation of discussions on gender and indigenous peoples’ rights, as well as the large presence of young people. The United Nations recognizes that voluntary commitments of government and business to 711 are potential levers for changing water policies. However, the outcome of the conference is ambiguous, fluid and non-binding, leaving open space for its consequences to be appropriated by those with more power, such as major industrial companies and multinational water companies.
The biggest challenge for global movements is to strengthen actions that are guided by the need to move forward to promote a new culture of water. Although some findings point to changes, making it possible to broaden responses to the global water crisis, mainly to unify water and climate agendas, the main problem is to resume the debate on water as a public good, moving from theory to practice.
Under this ultimate perspective, the results for the Brazilian people may be favorable or hostile. On the other hand, if we note an important change in the position of the Brazilian government, promoting an agenda to reduce inequality of access, which is often postponed, the disturbing aspect is the reversal of the prevailing view of the JNA with regard to privatization, which is likely to violate the rights of Human water and sanitation. It is, in this case, a reproduction of resistance to policies of social inclusion and access to rights that remain hidden in parts of the federal bureaucracy.
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