World Water Week Daily - Wednesday 28 August, 2019

STOCKHOLM
waterfront
world water week daily | THURSDAY 29 AUGUST | 2019
Full focus: Macinley Butson, 2019 Stockholm Junior Water Prize winner.
I CALL SCIENCE MY HOBBY
TEXT | ANDREAS KARLSSON PHOTO | thomas henrikson
Australian Macinley Butson is
the 2019 Stockholm Junior Water
Prize winner. She was awarded
for her research in measuring
solar disinfection of water.
It’s early morning the day after the
announcement of her prize win, but
Macinley Butson says that she did eventually
manage to get some sleep after an
overwhelming evening.
“It was fantastic in every way and it
hasn’t quite sunk in yet.”
Butson was awarded for an invention
called the SODIS sticker, which could
pave the way for a simple method of measuring
UV exposure for solar dis infection
of water in developing countries. The
sticker consists of two rings that start
off as green and blue. As the inside ring
is exposed to sunlight, it changes colour
and when the two colours match, the
water is safe to drink.
The main benefit is the simplicity
of the system. Existing UV metres are
expensive, while Butson’s sticker costs
less than one US cent to produce, and
it is very simple to use.
“The idea came to me during a geography
class when I heard about the
enormous problems with contaminated
water around the world,” she says.
For her age, 18-year-old Butson is an
impressively experienced scientist and
inventor. It is her second time at World
Water Week, having been a Stockholm
Junior Water Prize finalist two years ago.
Prior to that, she was involved in areas
such as cancer treatment, where she
invented a copper shield, with a design
similar to medieval armour, that can be
used to protect against excess radiation
during breast cancer treatment. In
2018, she was presented with the New
South Wales Young Australian of the
Year award.
She says that she’s always had the urge
to explore new things and that she
comes from a family where curiosity is
encouraged. Her mother is a teacher
and her father is a medical researcher.
“I was the kid who asked questions
about everything and my parents
inspired me to find the answers myself.
I call science my hobby. I guess normal
people would play tennis or go swimming,
but for me it’s always been science.
I’d like to use my curiosity to help people
as best I can”.
She says that the water sector fascinates
her and she calls her fellow Stockholm
Junior Water Prize finalists her new
family. As for her continuing work as a
young scientist, Butson says that she is
likely to do more work related to water,
however she does not want to tie herself
to a specific field yet.
“My favourite quote is from Albert
Einstein: ‘I have no special talent, I’m
only passionately curious’.”
published by stockholm international water institute

THURSDAY: WORLD WATER WEEK DAILY
ROYAL CELEBRATION FOR
WATER PRIZE
LAUREATE
On Wednesday Dr Jackie King
was presented with the 2019
Stockholm Water Prize by
H.M. King Carl XVI Gustaf
of Sweden.
Meet Dr King in Friday’s
WaterFront Daily.
Photo: Jonas Borg
Greening cities
Last year, World Resources Institute
(WRI) launched Cities4­
Forest, a movement to catalyze
support among govern ments
and city dwellers to inte grate
forests – in the widest sense –
with cities.
At Cities4Forests: 60 cities commit
to natural infrastructure citing
water benefits, Gabriela Morales,
Manager of Water and Urban
Resilience at WRI explained how
Mexico City, a highly resourceintense
urban area, is working on
adding natural green infrastructure
– even on a small scale.
“We try to match technical
potential with existing infrastructure;
we’re talking about
roof water harvesting, water
harvesting in public spaces, raingardens
and infiltration wells,
and this can be replicated elsewhere
in the city,” she said.
Mike Brown, an environmental
finance manager from San
Francisco, shared his experiences
of how green bonds have been
used to finance the city’s projects
to produce environmental
benefits.
“This is a big opportunity
and it works like any other bond.
Over the next three years we’ll
be planting 50,000 trees – a key
component to meet our carbon
neutrality target for 2050,”
he said.
BIODIVERSITY:
GOOD NEWS, BAD NEWS
Sobering truths and good news stories clashed during the Linking biodiversity
with inclusive development: why it matters session yesterday, which offered
sharply contrasting takes on the record and future of biodiversity conservation.
“Biodiversity conservation is not working. Biodiversity is neither valued nor
recognised,” Martha Rojas Urrego, Ramsar Convention said.
She criticised decisions taken on biodiversity for failing to be sufficiently
localised, particularly in terms of management of natural resources, where the
role of women was insufficiently recognised.
“We need to make biodiversity more relevant for policy
makers, raise political will and citizen engagement, because
we do have solutions,” she said.
“The conservation community needs to be honest with itself
that the approaches of recent decades haven’t worked,” Mark Smith,
International Water Management Institute, said.
“There are good news stories, sure, but we have to change
the way governance works,” he added.
“When considering the development of new targets, we
need to consider how we are going to transform ourselves
to deliver change at the pace that is needed,” Smith said,
before calling for the sector to work as a “network of
complementary capacities” to drive change.
“We’ve failed to explain why biodiversity is important,
that biodiversity is effectively the safety net for the planet
– we need to make that understandable for people and
politicians,” Karin Lexén, Swedish Society for
Illustration: iStock
Nature Conversation, said.
NUMBER OF THE DAY
164
NUMBER
OF ENVIRONMENTAL
ACTIVISTS KILLED IN 2018.
Source: Global Witness

STRIKING THE BALANCE
BETWEEN SOCIETY AND ECOLOGY
TEXT | GÖRREL ESPELUND PHOTO |THOMAS HENRIKSON
Our society and our ecosystems
depend on natural river flows and
finding a balance between the two
is crucial if we are to achieve the
SDGs, that was the overarching
message at the Stockholm Water
Prize Symposium: Finding the flow.
“We must rebalance how decisions are
made about aquatic systems. It took 30
years to get these concepts universal, but
now they’re there. Next comes the implementation
phase, which will be longer,
messier and more difficult, because it
involves politics and finance,” said Stockholm
Water Prize laureate, Dr Jackie King,
at the symposium yesterday that was
given in her honour.
Dr King summed up how her multi ­
disciplinary research team has developed
models over the years to understand social
and economic effects of disrupting river
flow.
“In the past, we didn’t realise that
building dams and using irrigation came
at a cost. And every river has a different
social cost. Now, we have to look after the
systems that look after us,” she said.
Hubert Savenije, member of the Stockholm
Water Prize Nominating Committee,
called on the audience to challenge
the hydrologic cycle and start looking at it
not as a mechanism, but as an active
agent that adjusts to its environment.
“It does this for its survival. If we are to
predict the future, we must understand
that the ecosystem is alive and we have to
start to think like an ecosystem,” he said.
Sunita Narain, Centre for Science and
Environment, highlighted the rights of
the river and how to protect those rights.
Less water must be used for agriculture,
we must change what we eat, and cities
must learn not to return wastewater into
river flows.
“We have only seen the
start of climate change.”
“We have only seen the
start of climate change and
we need to go back to the
drawing board and say:
the rights of rivers are nonnegotiable,”
she concluded.
Ertharin Cousin, former Executive Director
of the UN World Food Programme,
added an agrarian perspective to the
discussion.
“This is the first time I’ve been invited
to the World Water Week, and that is a
problem. We must get out of our silos in
discussions of water, food and energy,”
she said, promptly receiving a standing
invitation to the World Water Week from
organizers.
Sunita Narain at the Stockholm Water Prize Symposium: “The rights of rivers are non-negotiable.”
3
questions
to …
XAVIER
JAYAKUMAR,
MINISTER OF WATER,
LAND AND NATURAL
RESOURCES OF MALAYSIA
What is the most pressing
water issue in Malaysia?
“To ensure rural areas get
water and that the water
industry is able to be selfsustainable.
That needs a
mind-set change. At the
same time, the water industry
must be a non-profitable
organization because it
serves the people.”
How can you protect your
marine environment?
“It’s a challenge, 95 per cent
of our land is open to the
sea and we have monsoons
throughout the year. Monsoons
are becoming increasingly
severe and we have
serious seashore erosion and
marine life devastation, all of
which we have to address.”
What about plastic
pollution?
“We’ve had severe plastic
pollution issues and have
banned plastic bags and
straws. But we have a bigger
problem with ‘plastic
recycling’. There are people
who import plastic, though
it is banned, and it is not
recyclable plastic but waste.
At the moment we have
600 [shipping] containers
of plastic waste sitting in
our ports, we don’t know
what to do with them
and we don’t know which
country to send them back
to. And if we do send them
back, will they reach those
countries, or will they be
dumped in the ocean?”
Photo: Mikael Ullén

Facebook’s top storytelling tips
TEXT | ANDREAS KARLSSON PHOTO |MIKAEL ULLÉN
During this year’s World Water Week, social media partner Facebook
has been offering delegates tips and tricks on how organizations can get
the most out of their Facebook and Instagram profiles. Here are five
key take-aways from Sharon Yang, social media expert at Facebook:
1START WITH YOUR BEST CONTENT:
you have about three seconds to
catch people’s attention. Always go
with your best content at the start of
videos and slideshows.
2THINK MOBILE: social media is
almost exclusively experienced
on mobile platforms. On smaller
screens, square or portrait images will
work best, ideally with as little clutter
as possible. A lot of people choose to
view content with the sound off, so text
overlays or similar is always a good idea.
3KEEP THINGS AUTHENTIC:
authenticity usually trumps quality,
and people love behind-the-scenes
footage. This is an easy way to produce
interesting and inspiring content. Also
strive to humanize the content. People
want to see and listen to other people.
4FOCUS ON INTERACTION:
social media feeds are dictated
by highly advanced algorithms.
The more we interact with certain
content, the more likely are we to see
similar content in our feed. Encouraging
your audience to like, share and
comment on your posts will ensure
that you reach them again.
world water week voices
What’s your key takeaway from the Week?
Hassanatu Mansaray,
African Development
Bank, Sierra Leone
“Water is a
connector of
people. Leaving
nobody behind
means connecting
people in terms
of your ideas,
your knowledge,
your resources.”
Diana Caceres, Water
Integrity Network,
Germany
“Collaboration,
collective action
and thinking
outside the box.
We need to
document better
and show the
impact of what
works.”
Shehnaaz Moosa,
SouthSouthNorth,
South Africa
“It’s the first
time I’ve noticed
that gender is so
embedded in everything.
For me, this
is a big, big shift –
a sign that things
are moving in the
right direction.”
Colette Génevaux,
Programme Solidarité
Eau, France
“It’s been great
to see inclusion
presented in
terms of gender,
disability and
youth, as well
as lots of sessions
on sanitation and
all its aspects.”
Gareth James Lloyd,
UNEP-DHI Centre,
Denmark
“The momentum
of SIWI’s sourceto-sea
initiative;
the shift from what
people thought was
a good but complex
idea to it becoming
increasingly operational.”
Chibesa Pensulo,
Green Climate Fund,
Korea
“We need to
work harder on
engaging more
with the water
community to
build under standing
of climate finance
and what’s
available.”
App
Digital updates
Don’t forget to download the
World Water Week app, for all the
latest updates throughout the day,
and engage with us on social media.
Join the conversation on #WWWeek!
World Water Week
in Stockholm
Stockholm International
Water Institute (SIWI)
@siwi_water
@siwi_youth
Stockholm
International
Water Institute
www.vimeo.
com/siwi
STOCKHOLM INTERNATIONAL WATER INSTITUTE
Box 101 87 | Visiting Address: Linnégatan 87A
SE-100 55, Stockholm, Sweden
Tel: +46 8 121 360 00 | www.siwi.org
Publisher: Torgny Holmgren
stockholm waterfront daily • 25–30 AUGUST, 2019
SIWI EDITORIAL STAFF
Editor: Maria Sköld
Graphic Designer: Marianne Engblom
Tips and comments?
Contact us at: waterfront@siwi.org
WORLD WATER WEEK DAILY EDITORIAL STAFF
Görrel Espelund, Andeas Karlsson
and Nick Chipperfield
Photography: Thomas Henrikson
and Mikael Ullén