World Water Day 2021
Celebrating Water and the Future
World Water Day, which occurs every year on March 22nd, is a day to celebrate water and all the benefits it brings to us. Water is a necessary and important resource for many reasons. From drinking to bathing, cleaning, and sanitization, to industrial processes and more, water is everywhere and plays a huge role in everyone’s lives. But many people around the world don’t have access to a consistent source of clean, safe water, which is why a big part of World Water Day is also to raise awareness of water-related issues and promote conservation and positive change.
Learn More and Participate
Every year on World Water Day, the United Nations holds an event and releases their UN World Water Development Report which highlights a theme surrounding the importance of water and discusses the future of water development goals. This year’s theme is ‘Valuing Water’ and in the time leading up to the event, the public is encouraged to go on social media using the hashtag ‘#Water2Me’ to join a conversation discussing the many ways in which water plays a valuable role in the lives of different people in different communities around the globe. This year, the event hosted by the United Nations will be celebrated virtually via webinar. To learn more about World Water Day, check out the official website.
Why Clean Water (and World Water Day) is Important
One of the major reasons for the establishment of World Water Day by the UN in 1993 was to raise awareness of the world water crisis and establish achievable goals for bringing safe water to people in need in underserved communities around the world. Even today, hundreds of millions of people on Earth are without safe, clean water for daily use according to the UN Water’s SDG-6 Synthesis Report 2018 on Water and Sanitization. Water is essential for life; for drinking, but also for basic sanitization needs such as washing hands and bathing, and as factors such as climate change and growing populations change and develop, water is becoming scarcer in some areas. Furthermore, as the use of water in industrial processes surges, wastewater treatment and recycling are becoming increasingly important as well. A Sustainable Development Goal (SDG 6) has been put in place by UN Water to encourage better management of water, with the ultimate goal being clean water and sanitization for everyone by the year 2030. While that’s only nine years away now, we believe that it is an achievable goal, and hope that everyone does their part to make water a given for everyone. We’ll certainly be doing our part!