The growing water crisis for billions threatens global progress on everything from poverty to hunger to green growth. Yet no one is stepping up to deliver and coordinate the funding needed to avoid a catastrophic future. Jo Trevor sets out the urgent need for smart water financing – which is the focus of an Oxfam event at this week’s Marmalade Festival in Oxford.
As global water runs dry, how can we make sure billions don’t get cut off?
Over two billion people lack access to safe drinking water – and the situation is set to become bleaker still because of climate change, say Jo Trevor and Padmini Iyer. How do we build equitable and collective approaches to global water security that uphold everyone’s basic right to clean water?
My experience in Yemen shows progress is possible on water, sanitation and livelihoods – but all of this could be undone if violence returns
Nine years since the conflict in Yemen began, Oxfam Water and Sanitation Lead Fayad Al-Derwish reflects on positive changes he has seen in his two years in the job, calls for urgent action to meet the needs of displaced people returning to devastated homes, and shares his worries for the future if conflict re-ignites.
Water that works: how an alternative management model for rural water supply is proving its worth in Nepal
Traditional models of managing drinking water have delivered progress – but where these are failing, we now need to look at alternatives, says Oxfam’s Anjil Adhikari. In a blog for World Water Day, he shares a new model that could deliver a significant boost to water system performance and governance in rural Nepal and beyond.
There is no climate justice without water justice – and that must include fair water access for women
Nuzhat Nueary sets out five dimensions of fair and feminist water action.
What would a feminist loss and damage fund look like?
Myrah Nerine and Alex Bush introduce a new paper that calls on decision makers at COP28 to pay attention to the gendered impacts of the climate emergency.
The world cannot stand by as starvation is used as a weapon of war in Gaza
Starved and under siege, Gaza is both a humanitarian catastrophe and a crisis for our humanity, say Bushra Khalidi, Lawrence Robinson and Awssan Kamal. Ahead of this week’s global food security summit in London, they set out how international law forbids cutting off food to civilians – and why only a ceasefire will allow the massive response Gaza needs to end hunger, both now and in the longer term.
The unfolding water catastrophe in Gaza
The current crisis comes on top of a long-standing struggle for water in Gaza – and demonstrates again how access to clean water is often one of the first casualties of conflict. Bushra Khalidi and Awssan Kamal set out six ways the destruction and obstruction of water supplies is having devastating short- and long-term impacts on civilians.
Four ways women can help to end the Middle East’s water crisis
We know women have to be at the heart of designing and delivering the response to the region’s water problems, says Oxfam MENA’s Sally Abi Khalil. She sets out four principles for a fresh, feminist approach to managing water.
How clean water can flow from peace in Yemen
Last year’s truce in Yemen opened a window for Oxfam to establish a water supply to thousands in a conflict-hit border area. Now, says Fayad Al-Derwish, we desperately need that truce renewed to change the lives of many more people living without basic services