World Youth Water Alliance

World Youth Water Alliance (WYWA) is an initiative of the Green Youth Ambassadors 2006, youth towards ensuring environmental sustainability.

This is a youth and children focused program. This program has resulted from discussions initiated by Mr. Anugraha John (Programme Coordinator, Pipal Tree, India) with Mr. Ibrahim N. Al-Zu'bi ( Director of Environment Department, Emirates Diving Association), Ms.Varsha Ajmer (World Youth Foundation, Malaysia) and all the members of the Green Youth Ambassadors 2006 selected at the International Training on Environment and Disaster Risk Management held at Melaka, Malaysia in August 2006.

OUR AIM:

To help advance the achievements of the Millennium Development Goal 7 - Ensure environmental sustainability: reverse loss of environmental resources; reduce by half the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water; achieve significant improvement in lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers, by 2015 and Engage Youth to celebrate with us the International Decade for Action Water for Life 2005-2015.

OUR OBJECTIVES:

1. WYWA will engage youth at both local and global level, throughout the year and especially on 22nd March, the World Water Day (WWD) to organize various programs and events up to the year 2015.

2. WYWA will primarily undertake water awareness in schools and universities and among school and university teachers. The nature of these educational programs will be workshops, screening of films on issues related to water, photo exhibitions, direct exposure to problems the poor are facing, civil society and governance issues.

3. WYWA will create awareness about the growing urgency of issues related to water locally and globally.

4. WYWA will promote serious reflection and discussion on issues such as water depletion, wastage and pollution, degradation, water related conflicts, and recent moves to privatize water. WYWA will not just highlight the magnitude of the problem, but will also bring all stakeholders together to apply solutions that work.

WYWA is inspired and encouraged (directly or indirectly) by the following NGO Leaders, Activists and Environment/Water Experts:
Siddhartha, Jill Carr-Harris, Anupam Mishra, Dr Chan Ngai Weng, Leo Saldanha, Medha Patkar, Larbi Bouguerra, Ajit Muriken, Sudha, Edith Sizoo, Gustavo Marin, Rajendra Singh, Melissa Kwee,  Medha Patkar,Yolanda Ziaka, Philippe Robichon, Gail Richardson, Chirstian Souchon, Max O. Lindegger, Pedro Kraemer, Mary McBride, Richard Green, Ibrahim N. Al-Zu'bi, Theodore E.A. Oben, S.Vishwanath, Prof. James Gao, K. Pushpanath, Jack Sim, Dr. Ahmed Iftekhar, Professor Asano, Oscar Olivera, Catherine Coleman and many others.

WYWA - International Coordination Team

Alex Kazaglis - Australia
Adeyinka Ademola - Nigeria
Anugraha John – India
Elissa Smith - Canada
Hong Huiru Cheryl - Singapore
Nichole Carnevale & Chris Lewer - USA
Sarah Martin - France

The team will define the guidelines and the strategy, raise funds and act collectively in coordination with Regional and Country Coordinators to achieve the objectives of WYWA. 

“We shall not finally defeat AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, or any of the other infectious diseases that plague the developing world until we have also won the battle for safe drinking-water, sanitation and basic health care.”
Kofi Annan, United Nations Secretary-General

We invite Young Individuals (16-25 & 26-35) and Youth Organizations working on issues related to Water to join us in the celebration of the International Decade for Action Water for Life 2005-2015.

The decade between 2005 and 2015 are critical years to focus global attention on what should be obvious: Water for Life.

Each year more than 1 billion of our fellow human beings have little choice but to resort to using potentially harmful sources of water. This perpetuates a silent humanitarian crisis that kills some 3900 children every day and thwarts progress towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The consequences of our collective failure to tackle this problem are the dimmed prospects for the billions of people locked in a cycle of poverty and disease.

The root of this underlying catastrophe lies in these plain, grim facts: 4 of every 10 people in the world do not have access to even a simple pit latrine and nearly 2 in 10 have no source of safe drinking-water. To help end this appalling state of affairs, the MDGs include a specific target (number 10) to cut in half by 2015 the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking-water and basic sanitation. In addition, the UN Millennium Project Task Force on Water and Sanitation recently recognized that integrated development and management of water resources are crucial to the success or failure of all the MDGs, as water is central to the livelihood systems of the poor.

'Consumption of natural resources to meet human needs must be integrated in a larger effort of active protection and careful management of the environment'

….The Charter of Human Responsibilities….