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BACKGROUND
In 2008, the Canadian Water Network (CWN) awarded the UBC Program on Water Governance (PoWG) a four-year grant to lead a team of researchers from five Canadian universities on a project to improve water security in Canada
Water security is emerging as a paradigm for cumulative impacts assessment and watershed management and is a topic of great interest in Canada and world-wide. PoWG defines water security as: "sustainable access on a watershed basis to adequate quantities of water, of acceptable quality, for human and environmental uses". Another definition of water security is: "a multi-dimensional concept that recognizes that sufficient good quality water is needed for social, economic and cultural uses while, at the same time, adequate water is required to sustain and enhance important ecosystem functions" (de Loe et al 2007).
The overall objective of the project is to create a Water Security Framework (WSF) to improve water security in Canada by improving governance for source protection and land use. The WSF will be a 'toolkit' composed of a Water Security Index (WSI) and associated decision-support tools. The WSF will be user-friendly and use data already available to many communities. It will include at least five sets of variables: water resources/quantity, ecosystem water quality, infrastructure, human health, and governance capacity. It will differ from other, similar frameworks in its:
- comprehensiveness and integration (e.g. incorporation of governance variables)
- sensitivity to spatial variation (in some tools) and
- inclusion of decision-support tools
The WSF will be developed with two case study communities (Grand River and Lower Fraser Basins) whose input will be incorporated from the start. The team has made knowledge translation a key priority and wants to ensure that the research benefits water managers, policy makers and community watershed groups. In addition, the 'toolkit' will introduce the concept of water security to a broad public audience through the publication of a Primer in 2009 and a Canadian Water Security Manual in 2012.
Water Security Project Partners:
- Environment Canada
- Natural Resources Canada
- Walter & Duncan Gordon Foundation
- BC Ministry of the Environment
- Policy Research Initiative
- Health Canada; Township of Langley
- Grand River Conservation Authority
- Golder Associates
- Earth Sciences, SFU (and NSERC)
- Okanagan Basin Water Board
- Program on Water Governance, UBC
- SmartGrowth BC
- Polis Project, U Victoria
- BC Ministry of Agriculture
- Guelph, Waterworks Department
- Brantford
- Clearbrook Waterworks District
- GWSolutions
- Canadian Water Network
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