We organized an excellent UN World Water Day event on March 19 together with the Norwegian Hydrological Council and the Norwegian Water Association. This year’s theme was Gender Equality and Water. The livestream recording has so far been viewed online by 200 people. We had a full house at Asplan Viak, with 35 guests.
Many thanks to State Secretary Erlend Hanstveit of the Ministry of Culture and Equality for an excellent presentation on Norway’s gender equality policy and international solidarity.
We would also like to thank Norway’s Special Envoy for Climate and Security, Hans Olav Ibrekk, for an excellent presentation on the status and history of the UN’s sixth Sustainable Development Goal, concerning water and sanitation. Ibrekk explained that, unfortunately, the Sustainable Development Goal that has achieved the least progress is the water-related goal. We therefore sought to inspire Norwegian engineers and young people to travel abroad and work on water security and sanitation in developing countries.
We were also fortunate to be joined by Global Water Lead Mary M. Matthews from UNDP and Senior Adviser Bindu Bhandari from UN Women, who informed us about the global situation concerning women and water.
Finally, Senior Adviser Sara Lisa Ørstavik from Norad informed us about Norad’s development assistance projects focusing on women and water, and about how Norwegian engineers could contribute to international development projects relating to water. Senior Advisers Iker Montes-Burgos from the Red Cross and Michele Vecchi from Norwegian Church Aid helped highlight how their organizations work practically with technological solutions in developing countries.
FTU is especially grateful that we were able to reach upper-secondary students with this message. The Norwegian Junior Water Prize was presented, and the livestream chat was filled with comments from upper-secondary schools across the country. 🙂
Lina Amiri and Anna Blechingberg from the FTU Board put the program together.
