Water water everywhere, but... (*)

by Chloë Fox, septiembre 2000 -

Floating on the far eastern waters of the South Pacific is the Republic of Kiribati, made up of 33 islands covering an area of 811 square kilometres. All but one of these islands are low-lying coral atolls, built on a submerged volcanic chain and encircled by reefs. Not one of these islands rises more than eight metres above sea level. The 75,000 strong population lives cradled by the sea: it is their lifeline, their source of food, and their transport. More than one third of the republic's mostly Micronesian population is packed onto the Tarawa atoll, a densely populated area which is home to the country's capital, Bairiki, on the islet of South Tarawa.

In this area, some 30,000 people struggle to find water every day. It is not an easy task: groundwater is the main source of fresh water, and freshwater is an increasingly rare commodity in the Pacific. In 1995, the population of Kiribati was increasing at a rate of 1.4%. South Tarawa's population was increasing at 2.2%. In South Tarawa, the amount of water will decrease as the population increases. Private wells and rainwater account for the rest of the available fresh water. But wherever it comes from, water is scarce, and easily polluted.

Groundwater lies a couple of metres below very permeable ground, a delicate "lens" of fresh water that floats on top of saltwater. "If you pump it too hard, you will just bring up saltwater. And these days, if you use conventional wells, you will get salt water. In the past, the low population density made things different. Wells could be used, but now so many people are trying to pull water out of the ground that the water is becoming salinated," explains Ian White, who is the Jack Beale Professor of Water Resources, at the Australian National University, Canberra.

Since 1995, Ian White has visited Bairiki many times as part of an ongoing UNESCO International Hydrological Programme - PHI - South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission study of rainwater recharge of a freshwater lens in a water reserve at Bonriki. Given that the lands which collect these lenses of freshwater are often declared public water reserves, White and his team set out to examine the issues involved in the establishment and management of water reserves. From the very beginning, the aim was to involve the local community in the project and to identify local socio-cultural issues in land, water management and ownership.

"What they tried to do was to merge traditional hydrological science with a cultural component," says Dr Mike Bonnell, a programme specialist at the International Hydrological Programme (IHP). Ian White admits that it wasn't easy to get the study off the ground. "The people seemed very disconnected from groundwater," says White. "It was as if they didn't care, and had no idea that the water situation was becoming critical. They didn't seem to know too much about the water cycle."

Political conflict

Meetings with the elders of Bonriki village - the traditional owners of the water reserve - also revealed that the study was unknowingly caught up in a much wider, social issue. There was an ongoing struggle involving the elders and the government, with the elders seeking a considerable increase in financial and social compensation from the government, over the establishment of a water reserve and an international airport on Bonriki land. The conflict affected the reponses of the villagers, who thought that the research team were somehow involved in the struggle. White's team set about studying the social relationship the locals had with water, as well as more traditional hydrological studies about the source and volume of available water. The establishment of water reserves emerged as one issue that affected the whole community, and in which they took an interest. A look at legislation and institutional arrangements for water resources revealed a mass of conflicting situations: no legal agreement existed between the government and private land owners (who own the public water reserves on their land). Open dialogue between the Bonriki community and government representatives about the key socio-cultural issues affecting land use and water management was top priority. "The oral tradition in the Pacific is very strong," White explains. "One of the mistakes we made was relying on the printed word to get our message across. I gave a four page paper summarising our work to an official, who was going to present it to the government. He said it was too long. He said there were literally shelves full of expensive reports by consultants, reports that had never been read. In retrospect, I think we should have presented our report in a radically different way."

The UNESCO team proposed to educate local villagers about water, through school and community programmes, and then pass the management into community hands. The local government was not convinced.

"There were differences in the way we saw the potential outcomes, and the way the government saw it," says White. "We felt that the best way to handle water management was to give back the land to the people, and transfer the "pride" of water management to them directly. The government prefers to erect a fence around the water source, and do it itself. Our belief was that there were solutions which could address the concern of local residents - who had legitimate complaints about land ownership." Whatever solution the government decides on, White's team hopes it will be soon.

In their home town of Canberra (Australia), one person uses 560 litres of water per day. In Tarawa, that figure is down to 40 litres - and diminishing. .

This Article was published in UNESCO Sources UNESCO No. 126 September, 2000, pp. 14 and 15.