2019 “We, Women are Water” GAGGA Campaign

 

During the month of March 2019 and for the third consecutive year, the “We, Women are Water” campaign took place in the framework of International Women´s Day (8^th of March) and World Water Day (22^nd of March), bringing together different organizations and funds that form part of the Global Alliance for Green and Gender Action (GAGGA)  in Latin America.

The purpose of this campaign was to show the role of Latin American women defending the right to clean water, the specific impacts on women as a consequence of the disappearance and contamination of their water sources and support the actions and role of women in the management and decision-making processes related to this common good.

With postcards and videos that collected the voices and demands of women in Latin America, the campaign showed the multiple threats and pressures that women experience throughout the region when protecting this vital liquid, as well as the differentiated impacts and violence women face due to the lack of access to water. At the same time, diverse women make evident how they take on the additional caregiving roles and tasks to guarantee water for their families, without the latter implying more recognition and political participation in decision-making process for this common good.

Facing these problems and challenges, the women in their communities are developing innovative and sustainable alternatives to guarantee community-based and equitable water management. At the closing of the campaign, through an online panel, in which more than 430 people registered, women´s organizations in the region reflected about how women are resisting, promoting and defending women´s rights and the human right to water. They further emphasized that only by fighting together can true and ample transformations take place to guarantee women´s rights and the right to water for all.

Finally, women water defenders shared their own struggles for the preservation and governance of water through approaches that are participatory, equal and respectful of different local cultures and practices, and that generates within communities ownership and a harmonious relationship with the earth.

To view the postcards shared via social networks with the hashtag #LasMujeresSomosAgua, please click here.

To hear the online panel (only available in Spanish), please click on the following link.