Bildanfang© Frank OttenbrinkBildende

Dear readers,

Our country is blessed with a sufficient supply of water. Only occasionally do we experience water scarcity in exceptionally hot summers, when power plants are forced to reduce their output because the warmer water threatens fish populations or shipping operations have to be reduced due to low water. Nationwide, technologically advanced wastewater treatment and production methods generating low amounts of wastewater enable us to keep our valuable water, which is really a treasure, pure. 

Thanks to the services of our water utilities we always have access to drinking water of good quality. In the past few decades, our rivers have become cleaner again and in many places you can bathe in them. Does that mean that all is well? Unfortunately not.

Approximately one third of the world population lacks access to clean drinking water. Over 80 percent of all cases of disease or epidemics worldwide are due to a lack of safe drinking water, to poor hygiene or inadequate sanitation. Conflicts over the distribution of water are already a bitter reality. Therefore, by 2015 the international community wants to halve the number of people without access to clean drinking water and sanitation, as stipulated in the Johannesburg Millennium Goals. For Germany, which has made 350 million Euros available for this purpose and is cooperating with 60 partner states, this is a main area of focus in international development cooperation. We are making our experience and our know-how available worldwide by supporting water utilities in the Middle East, along the Mekong River, in Kabul, and in many African river systems such as the Nile, Congo or Niger Rivers. Our aim is to promote access to clean drinking water and basic sanitation.

In August, this year’s World Water Week in Stockholm, Sweden, brought another important aspect to the attention of the wider public – the direct influence of consumer behaviour on global water consumption. The production and transport of imported foodstuffs and other consumer goods frequently requires large amounts of water, referred to as hidden water or virtual water. This means that we in the industrialized countries take a share of the water resources of other, in some cases far more arid regions. Thus, all in all the production of one cup of coffee needs up to 140 liters of water, up to 10 liters are necessary to produce one A4 sheet of paper, and approximately 2,000 liters are used to produce a cotton shirt. Altogether, Germany is among the ten largest importers of virtual water. By influencing the amount of water consumed through responsible behaviour and sustainable consumption each and every one of us can make a global contribution. But we need to know the options available to us.

With a business volume of 250 billion Euros, the water sector is one of the international trade markets of the future. According to some prognoses, this volume will double to 500 billion Euros within the next ten years. With a 16.5 percent share of the market for water and wastewater technology components, Germany is second only to the US as the world market leader. Innovative technology is one thing but we also need integrated concepts and system solutions for water and waste water management. Achieving the Millennium Goals is in our own economic interest too. We must train people to get there. And it will not suffice simply to impart technical knowledge. What is needed is an understanding of complex interconnections in order to be able to develop unconventional approaches to problem solving which cannot be modeled on past experience.    

Worldwide sustainable use of water is one of the central challenges of the future. "Water" is a topic that lends itself to demonstrating the complexity of natural, social and economic interconnections, including globalization. It is also a valuable resource, the protection of which concerns us all. The necessary skills for competent action are one of the prerequisites of this. Yet, many people are still insufficiently informed. The new challenges we face demand that we be better prepared. This is exactly where education for sustainable development comes in in order to do justice to the complexity of the topic and to develop individual competency and to highlight possible courses of action.

The German National Committee for the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development has risen to this challenge by choosing "Water" as its primary topic for the year 2008. We have simultaneously managed to link up with the International Decade for Action "Water for Life". This is the first time that cooperation between the experts of two parallel UN decades was promoted in Germany. With my Ministry acting as the lead agency, the National Committee established a working group in which experts on education and water jointly devise today’s action oriented education on water issues.         

This cooperation is already proving to be highly productive. The water experts know the most pressing issues in the water sector and what solutions need to be found where, while the education experts can use their know how to bring the message across. In my own country also, continuous efforts for "water protection" in a broader sense of the term will be required. Like all Member States of the European Union, we aim to improve the status of our water bodies by 2015. Our goal is a good ecological status. This means, for example, once again acknowledging that waters are habitats for animals and plants and restoring the passability of rivers for migratory fish. The general public is already involved in the preliminary stages of planning in order to ensure that the interests of all stakeholders are taken into account. Education for sustainable development imparts the knowledge and skills needed to participate in this preliminary planning, such as technical understanding of the processes involved, the ability to articulate and balance interests and the ability to organize such processes.       

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all those whose commitment, ideas and good examples are contributing to the success of the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development.

Sigmar Gabriel