World Water Day 2024
What is World Water Day?
World Water Day is on 22 March every year. It is an annual United Nations Observance, started in 1993, that celebrates water and raises awareness of the 2 billion people currently living without access to safe water. A core focus of World Water Day is to inspire action towards Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6: water and sanitation for all by 2030.
2024 Theme: Water for Peace
The theme of World Water Day 2024 is “Water for Peace.”
When we cooperate on water, we create a positive ripple effect – fostering harmony, generating prosperity and building resilience to shared challenges.
We must act upon the realization that water is not only a resource to be used and competed over – it is a human right, intrinsic to every aspect of life.
This World Water Day, we all need to unite around water and use water for peace, laying the foundations of a more stable and prosperous tomorrow.
Key messages for World Water Day 2024
- Water can create peace or spark conflict. When water is scarce or polluted, or when people struggle for access, tensions can rise. By cooperating on water, we can balance everyone’s water needs and help stabilize the world.
- Prosperity and peace rely on water. As nations manage climate change, mass migration and political unrest, they must put water cooperation at the heart of their plans.
- Water can lead us out of crisis. We can foster harmony between communities and countries by uniting around the fair and sustainable use of water – from United Nations conventions at the international level, to actions at the local level.
Additional Resources:
A Note From Our President
The theme for this year’s World Water Day event is “Water for Peace.” With so many armed conflicts and natural disasters occurring worldwide, depriving billions of people access to clean water for basic human survival, the need for cooperation on water is greater than ever. NALMS mission is “to forge partnerships among citizens, scientists, and professionals to foster the management and protection of lakes and reservoirs for today and tomorrow.” These are the kind of partnerships needed to protect and rehabilitate clean surface waters into the future.
My grandfather was drafted into World War II, where he saw and experienced horrors that lived with him until his dying day at age 95. On that day, he looked back on his life with gratitude, with one regret. That one regret was that ‘all those boys’ he saw dead or dying didn’t get the opportunity to live a life like he had. Despite being an atheist, the lake he lived on in his latter years brought him healing and peace in a way that only gazing out across an open expanse of still reflective clean water can. This World Water Day, join NALMS in creating a positive ripple effect – “fostering harmony, generating prosperity and building resilience to shared challenges.” Because clean water in abundance is not only needed for healing the bodies of victims of war, famine and natural disasters, but also their psyche and souls.
Kellie Merrell
NALMS President
kmerrell@nalms.org
