07 Dec 2011
Rowing entwined with World Water Day
Without water rowing would not exist. Without clean water the scale of difficulty for rowing increases immeasurably. Today is World Water Day and this year the theme is ‘coping with water scarcity’. Scarcity relates to the present day problem of the lack of water in a number of regions of the world as well as the scarcity of clean water.
This is fact of life that already impacts rowers around the world, from Cyprus to Australia. Take Australia’s southern State of Victoria. Lake Wendouree, Lake Colac, Lake Weeroona and Lake Moodemere, former popular rowing venues now are limited in their use, un-rowable or simply – empty.
Take the 2005 Asian Rowing Championships on Hussain Sagar Lake in Hyderabad, India. Rowers were more concerned about the water, because of the high levels of pollution, than their rowing.
South Africa’s Roodeplaat Dam, home of the annual national championships and several other regattas, battles with eutrophication to the extent that the dam was closed to “any direct contact sport” for a period of 2006.
Australia’s popular rowing river, Melbourne’s Yarra River, which has spawned high class rowers like James Tomkins and Drew Ginn, has bacteria levels, caused by pollution from humans that regularly exceed levels considered safe for water use. Yarra rowers learn, if you row try not to fall out of the boat.
But there are also some success stories. Home of the Head of the Charles regatta, Boston’s Charles River in the United States used to be so polluted that a rower falling into the water meant an immediate trip to the hospital for vaccinations. Now the water quality has been upgraded to a level where often it is clean enough for swimming.
“FISA has to be a catalyst and enabler for the rowing community to think of water as a valuable resource and not as a given,” says FISA environmental working group member, George Kazantzopoulos. “Raising awareness amongst young rowers regarding the value of water will be a multiplier effect to a significant part of our society.”
“World Water Day is just a reminder, we must take care every day to enjoy this transparent liquid that gives life.”
Each year more than 1 billion people live without clean water. Behind this problem, four in 10 people do not have access to even a simple ground latrine and nearly two out of ten people do not have access to safe drinking water. The water problem impacts both developing and developed nations. Houston (USA) and Sydney (AUS), for example, use more water than they can replenish while large parts of Europe are affected by recurring droughts.
“Water is ultimately a shared resource. Two-fifths of humanity live in river and lake basins that lie within two or more countries. Tied together in a web of interdependence, these societies can either suffer from increasing political conflicts or benefit from cooperation. Shared management of river basins has the potential for yielding large benefits in terms of the quantity, quality and predictability of water flows.” – United Nations website.
World Water Day is endorsed by UN Water, part of the United Nations, and began in 2003. UN Water aims to support the efforts of member states to achieve water and sanitation goals and targets. In 2005 the UN declared the start of the International Decade for Action Water for Life, 2005 – 2015. This set water standard goals to be reached by 2015.
Rowing requires water. Take time to plan for the sustainability of our sport for the present and generations to come.
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