New Guide Advocates Taking the 'Soft Path' to Water Sustainablitiy

Newly elected municipal councils preparing to tackle tough sustainability issues have a new resource to assist them. The Soft Path to Water In a Nutshell outlines a new approach to freshwater management using sustainable solutions that are ‘soft’ on the environment. “Water conservation measures alone are not enough to move freshwater management in onto a sustainable path,” says Oliver M. Brandes, associate researcher at the University of Victoria’s POLIS Project on Ecological Governance and a co-author of the guide. “The key is to ensure that all ‘new’ water comes from better use of existing supplies and from changes in attitudes and water use habits.”

            The practical, 20-page guide by Brandes and co-author David B. Brooks of Friends of Earth (FOE) Canada outlines the step-by-step process for creating a ‘soft path’ plan that will be useful to water managers, policy makers and others concerned about sustainable water management. Instead of supplying more and more water to meet increasing demands, the ‘soft path’ approach involves providing water related services, such as new forms of sanitation, drought-resistant landscapes, urban redesign for conservation and rain-fed ways to grow crops. Soft path planning looks 20 to 50 years into the future and proposes major changes in our water infrastructure and institutions.

            Copies of the guide are available at www.waterdsm.org or www.foecanada.org or by calling the POLIS Project at (250) 721-6388 or FOE at (613) 241-0085.

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