Foreword: The role of the Botín Foundation to support the analysis of issues on water ethics

Abstract

This Special Issue is the latest activity and outcome from the support and commitment by the Botin Foundation to water and ethics over the last twelve years. The Botin Foundation (BF) began its activity in the field of water resources in 1998 when it launched the Groundwater Project (Proyecto Aguas Subterraneas or PAS), one of the first interdisciplinary assessments of groundwater governance. The project under the leadership of Prof. Llamas had Spain as a showcase for many of the ethical dilemmas faced in countries across the world, like the intensive use of groundwater resources for development. This and many other questions around groundwater are inherently ethical and thus the Botin Foundation became increasingly active in the field of water ethics. In the same year of 1998, Dr Jerry Delli Priscoli and Prof. Llamas were appointed as coordinators for the UNESCO Working Group on the Ethics of Freshwater Uses. This Working Group gathered a dozen international figures with different professional backgrounds and expertise. The Botin Foundation supported this important work, first by sponsoring the final session of this working group held in Almeria (Spain) in 1999 and second through the publication of a monograph (PAS no.5) collecting the main results of this meeting and other valuable work (available at www.fundacionbotin.org/agua.htm under publications). During the Second World Water Forum held in March 2001 in The Hague, the Director of the Groundwater Project, and current Director of the Water Observatory of the Botin Foundation, Prof. Llamas chaired a session on Water Ethics. In this session one of the main conclusions still pertinent 10 years on was the need to give equal importance to the utilitarian and intangible values of water. At the next World Water Forum in 2003 in Kyoto there was a session co-chaired with Cheryl Davis of San Francisco Water Supply Co. At this Forum, UNESCO presented a series of 13 monographs – the UNESCO Water Ethics Series – that mainly included the papers prepared by the Working Group on Water and Ethics. In 2004 together with the University of Harvard, the Botin Foundation hosted its Second Botin Foundation Water Workshop (2BFWW) to stimulate debate on the so called Water crisis myth or reality?.