H2O Catalyst: Live Interactive Broadcast from World Water Week

J. Carl Ganter: It was absolutely fascinating, listening to all the conversations and comments. One of the really secrets here is, I have a magic button so I can jump into all the sessions for a few minutes, and just was surfing really rich conversations. If anybody had joined us part way through, we’re talking about the value of water, particularly in context of conflict as well as peace making, and new tools and the outside pressures of climate change and social structures.

As our opening guest mentioned, there’s a larger conversation underway, around the value of water. And you can read more on the value of water and intersections, also with sustainable development goals, and a lot of the issues we’re talking about here today, from the high level panel on high water initiatives. You can learn more about this at sustainabledevelopment.un.org. A good spot to go, sustainabledevelopment.un.org/hlpwater, or just look for high level panel on water and you can have your input there as well. I also encourage our listeners to learn more about the sustainable development goals, particularly with the U.N. General Assembly Week coming up in the middle of September, and the systems and intersections of water, which is goal number six for those of you, the “water buffaloes”. Everybody knows that water is goal number six.

Now we’ll hear the highlights from our discussion leaders and then go back to a bigger group discussion for overall perspective. So let’s start with my colleague Brett Walton, Senior Reporter at Circle of Blue. Tell us a little bit about what happened in your group.

Brett Walton: Thanks Carl. We had a lot to talk about. The government of Kenya is committed to ending national drought emergencies by 2022. So Sunya and I talked about what does that mean to end national drought emergencies? And he said that the key for his authority is that they have a drought early warning system, and that allows them with boots on the ground, field reporting, to collect data on water supplies, on health, on livestock, or range lands and to be able to target assistance to the communities that are most in need. Their mandate covers the entire country, but they’re focused mostly on the arid and semi-arid lands. Right now that is largely in Northern Kenya where the drought this year has been most severe, but within the National Drought Authority.

And then with a myriad number of partners both within the country from the local county level governments to international partners, such as U.N. Development Program, World Student Program. There’s a number of programs within Kenya to try and cut down the amount of violence and conflict and misery that comes from drought and water scarcity.

Do we see that the lack of water changes the value of other things. The value of education? A lot of people don’t go to school during drought because they have to move with the herds. So Kenya is instituting a cash transfer program to send direct money deposits into bank accounts for people to be able to use for food, or health, or education, whatever they need most at that time. And that’s all linked to that early warning drought system that they have in place.

Other programs are cash transfers for livestock, and then arms reduction program to try and get the guns out of the equation. So really, all sorts of values are in play here in Kenya, trying to respond to these major drought emergencies.

J. Carl Ganter: Wow, what a dynamic conversation. And a whole new way of looking at the value of water. Reaching all the way through education and shepherds. Really fascinating. And in group two, equally so, was Corrine Graff in discussion with Geoff Dabelko, of Ohio University. Geoff, it’s really great to hear your voice, and to have heard a bit of the conversation there. Give us a sense of what happened in your group.

Geoff Dabelko: Thanks Carl. Thanks so much. We really got through a lot of material. Corrine had some specific insights on for example, aspects of fragility so critical to the water drought conflict linkages. Talking about, really the lack of institutional capacity and mechanisms to resolve conflict and to mitigate drought impacts in these places. That the conflicts themselves divert resources, so it really impedes access to trade. Agricultural production destroys infrastructure, so it makes it harder to respond to these stresses. And then as the conflict deepens, and democratic checks and balances erode, the parties often resort to more desperate tactics that are often targeting the civilians who are trying to deal with the underlying drought and water conditions. It has strong implications for policy makers. Donors really need to come to terms with the reality that famine affected countries really have to address the conflict as a way to address the famine. Otherwise, we’re really just treating the symptoms. And that that humanitarian aid, while it is immediate and needed to save lives today, really must be leveraged to put in resilient strategies to deal with these problems more systematically. Help them recover from shocks and mainstreaming that resilience across humanitarian response. In that sense, Carl, for anticipation versus reaction. And that investment will actually be cheaper in the long run.

Integrating data across getting the high level folks to understand and make policy based on how these different issue areas that often are often treated separately, come together. That’s being done on the ground, and in some of the technical levels, but not yet enough at the higher levels. And then we had an opportunity to hear about some specific ways that that’s succeeding. But finally, to end the challenges, we are seeing evidence of people applying new lenses to look across these issues, yet they still have their particular areas of focus that aren’t necessarily integrated enough. That is conflict, that is climate change, that is countering violent extremism, and that we see some opportunities for those lenses and the necessity of those lenses to come together and collaborate, rather than working in isolation and at times, at odds with one another.

J. Carl Ganter: Wow, another terrific group. Really dynamic and timely, with a huge level of urgency. Geoff Dabelko, thanks for reporting from group number two. And finally in group number three, Ramon Scoble is paired with Robert-Mark De Souza of the Wilson Center. Roger-Mark, what emerged in your conversations?

Roger-Mark: Thank you very much, Carl. I think we had a very engaging conversation around three broad areas. The first focus on trends. What are we seeing in Yemen? What has the pace and rate of change been? We talked about the spread of modernism for the society overall and that they were accelerating trends, in regards to technology and mobile phones, but slower progress in terms of water policy. As part of looking at the trends in technology, we talked about this race to the bottom of aquifers and what that meant in terms of a potential for conflict. And we also examined ways that climate change was having an impact, with regards to political stratification of agriculture, and what that meant for water resources.

Second, we examined conflict dynamics. And we deconstructed various types of dispute resolution mechanisms. Looking at one source one user, few users few sources, multiple users and multiple sources and what that may mean in terms of conflict being more complex. And what does that mean in terms of rural and urban dynamics and this move of the haves to the have-nots, and what that means ultimately.

And finally, we talked a little bit about what are the implications of these upper policies or programs and those solutions. We touched on questions around the health impact. We discussed the cholera epidemic and how it had been dealt with. And in those areas where there were more water resources, they were able to implement solutions. We talked about infrastructure, that there was not so much war looting, but that there was a demolished infrastructure, and the necessity of thinking about population dynamics. Quite significant popular growth and this was in an area that’s tied very specifically to looking at the impact on water and people’s well being. So an engaged and dynamic conversation.

J. Carl Ganter: Thank you, Roger-Mark. I really appreciated those insights. Again, all these conversations are absolutely terrific, and really important and timely. In just a moment we are going to bring everyone back together in full group conversation, so we have a chance to ask questions across groups. And we’ll be taking more questions from you, both through the screen and live. So you’ll be able to raise your hand. You’ll hear more about that in a second. If you do have a question, you’ll be able to raise your hand using your phone keypad, as we mentioned. And your MaestroConference interface on your screen, or continue to use your document on your screen to type your question.

But before the group discussion, we want to introduce one more special guest. And that, sitting to my immediate left is, Maitreyi Das, and she has joined us here in Stockholm. She’s the World Bank’s Global Leader for Social Inclusion, and author of a report published earlier today, on water and gender, called Rising Tide. You’ve been listening to the conversations. Thanks for joining us. How does gender relate to the value of water, particularly in an era where we do have so many water stresses?

Maitreyi Das : Thank you so much, Carl. It’s a great pleasure to be here, and to have heard some of the discussion earlier. The new report, The Rising Tide, actually lays out what we call a thinking device, to think about the relationship between water and gender, which at the best of times is very complex. But in cases where there is water stress, it becomes even more complex. Not only is the relationship complex, the relationship is also sometimes quite unexpected. One of the things that we bring out in the report is that not all women are disadvantaged, nor all men privileged. It is really the overlay of disadvantage that arises from a status-like race or class, or caste, or location, or sexual identity, or a myriad of social identity markers that make certain groups more vulnerable than others and really being able to understand, these complexities will give us a much better sense of who is most likely to be left behind, or left out, especially in times of scarcity, when resources are scarce. And when the people with the least power are the ones that are likely to be the ones least likely to get the benefits.

So that’s sort of the overarching theme of the idea of how gender and water intersect. But there’s are two other points that are really important for the discussion of the values of water. One is that water quite often mirrors social inequalities that exist elsewhere in society. They play out in the domain of water. So, that’s one big issue. The second issue is that water has got significant non-economic and non-monetary values. These could be spiritual, cultural, political. They could arise from, for instance, an indigenous community considering a river to be so sacred that it is like the mother. And so any perceived onslaught on that river is taken extremely negatively by a community that values that river quite differently from somebody that doesn’t belong to that indigenous community.

And these are deeply gendered norms and practices. These non-economic and these spiritual, emotional values of water are deeply, deeply gendered, where women and men, males and females have got different roles and responsibilities, with respect to the way in which they engage with the water body.

Just to give a very quick example, the concept of the Holy water exists in every single religion. There is no religion where the concept of Holy water does not exist. And certain waters are holy, but then certain waters are polluting. So for instance, waters or liquids arising from bodily waste are universally considered to be polluting. And there are cultures would consider them more polluting or less polluting. But regardless of the fact of the degree of pollution, the fact is that these norms and practices, to a very large extent, affect the behaviors of individuals in groups. Particularly of the context of the way in which they relate to gender, and the way in which they relate to hierarchies. These get intensified when the resources are scarce. These get intensified at times when people believe that they have something to hold on to, or not have something to hold on to.

J. Carl Ganter: Great. Thank you so much Maitreyi, I appreciate that perfectly timed input. And really, to tie all our threads together, we’re going to bring our panelists, moderators, and our listeners all together. It’s a dexterous feat of magical mouse clicking by our team at MaestroConference. So hold on for just a minute, and I hope you raise your hand if you have any questions, we’ll be able to take those live.

Let me just ask Geoff Dabelko. Geoff, we’ve worked together almost 15 years now, believe it or not. I want to hear from you briefly, how you’ve heard this conversation change. We started talking about just really just water. What’s changing here in the conversations you’ve heard here today? What you’re hearing from your students, over this interesting, interesting decade.

Geoff Dabelko: Thanks Carl. I think a couple things. [inaudible 00:49:34] breakout in particular. I think that it’s notable that the entire conversation isn’t about how water scarcity causes conflict. It’s a much more, and always has been a much more complex discussion. But the bumper sticker versions ruled the day, for a long time, and in some corners still do. But our conversation was much more nuance, much more dynamic, with both how conflict makes it much harder to adapt to water stresses, drought, and in some cases, addressing famine. So the causal arrows go both ways.

And then what I think is also new is that recognition is increasingly but not yet sufficiently integrated into responses. So we had a discussion about how resilience needs to be a part of even the immediate humanitarian responses. So that a cross sectors, economic, political, social, environmental, that a process of trying to lessen the next one, because there will be a next one. Whether that has conflict, or whether that or their connections to water with extreme events and such, that we start working across our silos and break out of those, and understand that that is the only way that we are gonna really effectively respond to these complex interconnections.

J. Carl Ganter: Great. Thank you, Geoff Dabelko, formerly of the Wilson Center, and your colleague also Roger-Mark De Souza. Roger just also quickly, now that you’ve heard the report outs. Anything that’s changed in your mind, over the last few years, working on environmental change and security programs?

Roger-Mark: Thank you very much. I would build on Geoff’s comment, I think that there is more sophisticated awareness of the need to deconstruct different parts of influence that fit into the different dynamics. So more and more we see those in the policy and programmatic space, looking at the social, the societal context. The context of the environment and ecologist relates to water. The effect on human systems. What a human response is, and what are the feedback mechanisms that we see present. And I would also say increasingly there is a recognition of paying attention to social dynamics. Questions around gender and population growth are also gaining, increasing salience and recognition.

J. Carl Ganter: Great. Thank you Roger-Mark. Maitreyi, again, the changes that you felt that you’ve seen after listening to the report outs. And just again, the bigger perspective. What kind of changes have you seen, and what do we expect to be coming out of, the sustainable development goals week? The U.N. General Assembly Week coming up in New York, week of September 18th.

And before you answer, I want to remind our audience, raise your hand. Press one on your phone, or your social webinar button, and we can call on you and take your questions live. So, please go ahead and do that, and we’ll be able to take your questions.

Maitreyi Das : I’m actually really glad to hear about this more nuanced idea of the relationship between conflict and scarcity. I mean, I’m a demographer, and so to me, it’s really a question of scarcity really intensifies all kinds of exclusions and inequalities that already exist in society. And the manner in which individuals and groups can lay claim to the resources that perhaps were scarce to start with, but become even scarcer during times of drought, for instance. And that’s the point at which, it’s not just the way water is valued, but the way in which resources broadly are valued. And natural resources broadly are valued. And who has a voice over them, or who has control over them, and who doesn’t.

So the power relations that kind of shift a bit during times of conflict, become extremely salient in the manner in which people respond to them. The idea of power, the idea of a much more nuanced understanding of the dynamic between scarcity and conflict, I think is going to be extremely important.

Let me a very quick take there on the idea of population growth, I’m not sure it is necessarily, I mean across the board, except for nine countries in the world, fertility is on a downward incline. And so fertility decline has commenced. It is already in most countries quite far along. There are some countries, which are fairly early in the demographic transition, but regardless, the transition exists, has begun everywhere. Except, as I’ve said, about nine or 10 countries, and those countries do tend to be countries that have very weak institutions. But that’s a separate conversation. So I think that that blanket lumping together of population growth, conflict, scarcity, I think is not a useful construct.

J. Carl Ganter: So, Brett Walton, we’re having quite a conversation here, and you’ve covered this for a long time. What are some of the questions that have been coming over to your [inaudible 00:55:25]? Either through the call here now, or overall. What are some of the big pieces you’re looking at on Circle of Blue, and putting this is in continued context?

Brett Walton: Right. Well, one of the questions that we had coming in before the call here is, the connection between local dynamics and global, and how some of these local conflicts have their roots in transnational dynamics. And with the speakers who want to address this, climate change is a big one, where it has an international driver, but it’s reflected in local circumstances. So I guess the question here is how can you one, build resilience in local communities in the face of things that need a global response often?

J. Carl Ganter: And you’re tossing that out to the group.

Brett Walton: I’m tossing that to the group.

J. Carl Ganter: Who’d like to take that?

Brett Walton: So, Ramon, I think would be a good candidate to answer this, having worked in Yemen with local groups for quite a while. So how do you see these dynamics playing out? How do you solve this at the local level?

Ramon Scoble: Thank you so much, Brett. I do think that at the local level you really do have an advantage that you can get most of the clients to sit down around a table. In a relatively low education setting like Yemen, the very first part will be actually teaching people just about water. What it is, what their part is in the larger water cycle. The water management cycle. How that water cycle impacts upon the social, or ecology of their community. And I can almost say that, with almost two decades experience in Yemen, it’s been pretty rare at a community level, that we haven’t been able to get people to come on board, understand what the issues are, and at least resolve a specific direction to work in. That’s been a lot more difficult to deal with when we’ve been looking at multiple jurisdictions, multiple communities. And as I mentioned in our breakout, when you look at multiple uses for multiple sources, it’s no different to dealing with those same issues in a much more developed country. Hard to get everyone to the table. Hard to get agreement.

Brett Walton: You say it’s very easy when you’re dealing with people who can all come to the same room and share the same community. Does that scale? And how can we transfer that to some of these broader questions about value and conflict?

Ramon Scoble: Well I think the key way to get things to scale is really to find people who are genuinely representative. Like they are the genuine representative for the group. You know, if it’s two individuals dealing with a single law, you can sit the two down together. If it’s two large extended families with a couple of under people each, you simply don’t have many venues, so they’re gonna come with five hundred people you really need to find people who are empowered by their groups, to speak on their behalf and to negotiate solutions. And I think that’s what international diplomacy is, it’s when you do that with a billion people in one country and a billion in another, and you’re talking about shared water resources.

Brett Walton: One of the questions that’s coming into the group discussion document here asks about water issues in wealthier countries. And we’re seeing this today in Houston, in the United States. Someone asked me before this call, I cover a lot of water topics, what challenges and solutions do I see? Even in the U.S., in other countries too, where water infrastructure management has been ingrained and embedded within culture and society, that we’ve ignored it. It’s basically worked so well in the past that we didn’t have to think about it. And some of the past dependencies. You know, Houston is having a lot of hard scape and now having water that can’t really go anywhere. Those types of questions for rich countries, are coming to the fore just the same as they are for any country across the world. There’s the recognition that water has been taken for granted in the past. And that’s no longer how things have to operate.

The question of taking water for granted, is that something that say, Sunya in Kenya, that people are coming around to? Do you see people changing their relationship to water in these droughts?

Sunya Orre: Yeah, basically water is one of the key[inaudible 01:00:33]. And at the community level they are focused and I am sure that I am looking at one of their graphs at the moment [inaudible 01:01:00]. For example the Green [inaudible 01:01:43].

Brett Walton: Right. We talked on our break I believe, about the cash transfers that are going on in Kenya. There’s also another question coming through the shared document that I think connects this local and global question. The question here in the document is that developed countries enjoy water rights. Its legal institutions that’s forced arrangements to manage water. So really strong value on the relationships and the legal contracts. This question goes to Corrine, who’s worked in several countries throughout Africa, on some of these questions. So it’s a question of the value of legal rights and institutions and how do we establish those types of responses in countries that might not have them. Is there the ability to transfer ideas about these values, from country to country?

Corrine Graff: I think that’s a critical question in light of the link to fragility, more broadly. Its important both as a conflict resolution mechanism, as well as for better management of water resources. Every context is different. In many countries they’re actually informal systems that are in place, that are working. They often can be exploited by conflict parties, which is another whole dynamic and issue, but they need to be built on by national governments who are struggling to build up their institutional framework, their legal frameworks, and property rights frameworks. But yes, I think that’s a critical element of the resilience agenda. Not the state building because that’s a little bit of an overblown term, but building resiliency in countries that are affected by the twin challenges of conflict and drought. Although, of course, every context is different.

Brett Walton: Right. And we talked about this early on. One of the questions we posed to our early round table was about building resilience. Not just for infrastructure, but for people. So that I think what you’re getting at is some of the institutions, some of the laws and rules of the game, trying to transfer those. Because that’s really at the base of any response, is that you have to have people that know their contracts will be enforced and know that they have some arbiter to say that yes, this is to make final decisions in these judgments.

Corrine Graff: [crosstalk 01:04:24].

Brett Walton: Oh, go ahead.

Corrine Graff: Sorry, I was just gonna say Brett, it is. And I think it’s also vital to, in the development community, to preserving development games and other sectors. I think that’s a critical aspect of resiliency as well. And it’s really intended to preserve and not allow these countries to fall back.

Brett Walton: So I think we probably have time for one more question. Scanning through the shared document here for something that’s good to wrap up on. I think there’s an open question here at the end that kind of goes to things that everyone’s talked about. And that’s how do you align all these forces together? Sunya and I talked about some of that in Kenya, where they’re prioritizing based on data from the field, but do any of the speakers know good examples where all of these actors and all of the data, and all of the institutions have been brought together to really join hands to go after one of these problems of value, conflict, and drought?

It’ll be dispiriting.

Geoff Dabelko: A revealing time. Geoff Dabelko. I would say, as opposed to an example, I’d say it really requires top cover and leadership to appreciate this in a way that doesn’t just exhort what starts to change some of our institutional impediments to doing it. We really like our silos and that’s the appropriators, that the people in the field. Those are the people at mid-level management in the donor agencies. And it’s most often those on the ground, the affected, who don’t have the luxury of staying in these different segmented silos. And so, I think part of it is if we can meet in the middle with a push from the field based, and a real top down one that really requires us to change some of our structures, and frankly, even how we study and understand these issues. It really takes breaking some of those down. It’s a long term, and it’s really easy to say, it’s much harder to do.

We did talk about some examples, and in Kenya example of how that is happening. But nevertheless, it really requires all of us to get together at multiple levels, to tackle it together.

Corrine Graff: And to build on that, Brett, one other example I would refer to, and I think highlights something that’s also really important here, because one of the questions talks about how realistic doing this is in developing countries, versus in wealthier countries. It’s to really set expectations appropriately. These buildings come with this system as the work of generations, not the work of administrations, or even less years. And so, there’s some really promising examples right now of activities and developments in Somalia. That maybe sounds counterintuitive but where at the local level citizen trust is being increased, resilience to drought, there are activities to increase resilience to drought. And we’re seeing Al Shabab in particular was ground. And we’re seeing frankly, the incidence of conflict and violence more broadly drop to some extent. So they’re very small steps, in addition to a very ruly partner at the national level. And a government that’s willing to take the steps. I think the challenge there will be linking the national level to the community level, and what’s happening at the community level.

But all that to say that they’re small steps. But there are examples I think in a number of countries, they’re just modest. But I think that’s where our expectations should be.

Brett Walton: All right. Thanks, Corrine. Always good to end on a hopeful note.

J. Carl Ganter: Thank you, Corrine.

Brett Walton: Back to Carl for a close here.

J. Carl Ganter: Yeah, thanks so much Brett. I did want to say, we have Alicia Douglas with her hand up. Alicia, we have time for just a quick comment. And then I wanted to ask our group two, since we’re covering these issues as journalists, and as citizens of the planet, where do we keep our eyes, just very quickly. But we’ll go to Alicia first. But where should we keep our eyes, geographically? Or even institutionally for the big change? Up or down? Where are the hot spots and where are the bright spots?

Alicia Douglas, quick comment and then we’ll go back to our panelists and I’ll do some credits and some thank yous.

Alicia Douglas: Hello Carl. Thank you so much. I hope everybody is well, wherever you are calling in from. I just wanted to make just a quick, and I put it up on the page, in regards to the internet of water report. That there has been a lot of comments that have been coming in, in regards to how can people that don’t have power be able to connect with the internet of water concept of what we’re doing. And so I think I’d want to refer back to that as being [inaudible 01:09:35]. I mean, they are boots on the ground with what Carl was doing, he becomes boots on the ground of sharing that data. So again, I just wanted to put it out, for dialogue, I encourage all of you guys to really look at imagining an internet of water and that becomes an open beta, [inaudible 01:09:50] platform. And I’ll leave it at that Carl. Thanks so much.

J. Carl Ganter: Thank you Alicia. I appreciate that too. And when we talk about it every night, of water we talk about, I was just reading about soft big data and I was just reading about soft data. The whole idea about not just numbers, but real people in real context. Kind of perception and reality. And that’s where we are. So very quickly, lightening round for our guest speakers and moderators. Where should we be pointing our lens if we’re journalists, if we’re concerned citizens? Where are the hot spots, where should we be looking, where should we be watching? And then, what are the bright spots? Give us a spot to point our compass. Sorry, I should’ve said somebody could go first. Roger-Mark, how about you start us off?

Roger-Mark: Oh thank you very much. I think here there was a saying, that we are continuing to track what’s happening in Asia. You know, Central Asia, Pakistan, India, the Himalayas, some of the areas in the greater Mekong subregion, and the Philippines. So we saw a lot of the complexities of dynamics there. And we continue to learn from some of the work that’s happening around collaboration in the Middle East. We see some of our partners with a group such as Eco-Peace Middle East implementing. So there are some opportunities that we continue to track.

Geoff Dabelko: Dabelko, can I jump in and follow on Roger-Mark, and emphasize our opportunities for our shared interdependence around water to be an avenue for dialogue. Sometimes it may not be easy, but dialogue that’s necessary, given our shared interdependence on water, and that that could be a basis for building trust and hopefully peace. And so, turning the water and conflict link on its head and trying to use that very interdependence as a force for conference building as the Eco-peace that Roger-Mark mentioned are doing in dynamic and impactful ways in the Middle East.

J. Carl Ganter: Great, thank you Geoff. And then, Corrine, where should we be pointing our lenses? Again, the hot spots, and the bright spots.

Corrine Graff: I think the bright spots are the developing country governments that are taking this on themselves, and creating resilient strategies. And I think the rest of the world needs to come in behind them, and support them. I think the hot spots geographically right now, are the great lakes, the DRC, and the humanitarian crises there that are in the shadow of the others. And I think another challenge, opportunity is developing the political will, or political framework at the global level, to address this challenge. We have the data, we have the information, we have the local programs in place. But I still think we need the political will at higher levels.

J. Carl Ganter: Great. Good point too. And Sunya Orre. Are you still with us here?

Sunya Orre: Yes, thank you very much. In Kenya, we have stories outside of Africa when it comes to water management. I can give for example, the case of [inaudible 01:13:13], which is basically a well [inaudible 01:13:16]. But transfer of knowledge, because a solution to this [inaudible 01:13:29]. So we look at the opportunities that exist, in terms of the technology, or political advancement. Yeah, so that’s the kind of opportunities that we are looking at. How can we make a global community?

J. Carl Ganter: All right, thank you Sunya. And then, last words from Maitreyi Bordia Das. Bright spots, and our hot spots. Where should we be looking?

Maitreyi Das : Is inequality. So inequality is definitely the hot spot that is going to drive additional hot spots. So just in terms of, I’m not talking geographical but just inequality and buckets of perception of inequality, whether or not that inequality really exists. But perception of inequality, I think is extremely important. Perception of being left out. I think that more than that. So inequality itself, and the perception of being left out. Those are the hot spots.

The bright spots I would say are states themselves. The state. And we’re seeing an era of strong states, and that’s got its own hazards. But if we’re going to make a difference, we’re gonna make a change, it’s going to be governments and states, and their relationships with citizens that is going to change things.

J. Carl Ganter: Great. Thank you so much, Maitreyi Bordia Das. And I want to say thanks to all of our guests for sharing their time and expertise. So what we’ve heard today I hope gives us a real sense of urgency. But also path for water as a unifying force, in an era with so many disruptions. As journalists, we tend to cover a lot of the bad news. We’ve heard a lot of also good news today. And also a lot of reframing of the picture. How the perception of being left out, far beyond geography, of these challenges.

But I want to say a special thanks to our guests for sharing their time and their expertise. Torgny Holmgren, Claudia Sadoff, Anders Jagerskog, Richard Damania, Sunya Orre, Corrine Graff, Ramon Scoble, Maitreyi Bordia Das. And to our facilitators, good friends all. Brett Walton, Geoff Dabelko, Roger-Mark De Souza. And here in Stockholm, we’ve had help from Circle of Blue’s Cody Pope, Laura Herd, and Matthew Welch, with Conner Beb on social media back in Michigan. And the MaestroConference team, back in San Francisco. And a special thank you to our collaborators. Our hosts here at the Stockholm International Water Institute, running the Stockholm World Water Week, The Netherlands, and The World Bank.

And H2O Catalyst was produced by Vector Center. Follow the results of the Catalyst Series online at circleofblue.org, and h20catalyst.org will publish transcripts and the full podcast version in segments of this program online, very shortly. And from all of us at Circle of Blue and Vector Center, here in Stockholm and around the world, World Water Week too, thank you so much, and I’m J. Carl Ganter.