Thursday Twofer
So you're getting two reports in one today.
I omitted giving a shout-out to the Secretariat of the Sixth World Water Forum for its effort in keeping the paper waste down. A limited number of paper copies of the program were printed; instead, an interactive program is online and there are Android and iPhone apps available.
Here are the newsletters for 14 March and 15 March.
Picture Perfect
So who's this? Another Frenchwoman plying me with chocolate mousse? My granddaughter?
It's Kim Ogren, one of our extremely bright OSU Water Resources graduate students and President of the OSU Hydrophiles. I'm sporting the Hydrophlies T-shirt.
Kim won a scholarship to the 6WWF as part of the Emerging Academics Program.
She introduced me to Kelly Douglas, an American Master's student studying in London. Another bright one! It's great to see such talent coming up through the pipeline.
Want more?
Odds 'n Ends
1) One of my colleagues was incredulous after listening to a speaker wax idiotically about water accounting and management that failed to include environmental requirements and provided no projections.
2) Another speaker discussed the need for a water budget to plan for groundwater development.
3) A comment made to me while I watched a USBR video at the USA Pavilion that used the phrase 'climate change': 'Can they say that?'
4) Retort by US government employee to question in (3): 'Yes, if Republican lawmakers are not present.'
5) Serving as rapporteur at the Sustainable Management of Multiple Use Water Services. A puzzling session, except for: Wat A Game: managing and sharing water in your basin. Here is a PDF.
6) Serving as rapporteur at the Americas' Water-Energy Nexus session. Very good panel, 15 attendees that had shrunk to 6 by the end of the session. Too bad!
7) Sitting on a panel listening as a colleague says, with a straight face, that 'climate models are more accurate than hydrologic models.' Jaws dropped. Grown men and women sobbed aloud. Another colleague politely informed him that he was full of s**t. An argument was about to ensued but was politely deflected by a skillful moderator.
8) On the same panel, having failed to prepare a Power Point, I took the wireless microphone and played host on the exciting new game show 'Let's Make a Groundwater and IWRM Deal'. At least it woke up the audience.
9) Great seeing water ethicist David Groenfeldt and hydrogeologist extraordinaire and good friend M. Ramón Llamas.
10) I realized today why 'serendipitous networking' is more difficult here than at 5WWF in Istanbul: here there are five huge buildings (plus a number of smaller ones and tents) so people are more dispersed and outside because of the nice weather. At Istanbul, there was one huge building and one more smaller building so the people were more concentrated. That's my theory, and I'm sticking to it.
11) The move to get the World Water Council took invest in outcomes assessments seems to be gaining traction. If the WWC decides to do it, then they should not wait but start to implement it immediately by going back to the results of the First World Water Forum in 1997.
12) I am missing a lot of good sessions on WaSH, indigenous rights, and the Alternative World Water Forum.
Time to go - more coming!
"Un bon mot ne prouve rien." - French proverb (Translation: "A witticism proves nothing.")
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