Dwarshuis, Van Haegen, Ghosh and Kirtikar at the Dutch pavilion of the World Water Forum in Mexico City

Calcutta lessons for the Dutch and vice versa, from dykes to delta management, to tide over water woes, exchanged in Mexico City?

City-based think-tank organisation Centre for Built Environment (CBE) has signed knowledge and tech-sharing pacts with the governments of three provinces of Holland on disaster risk-management and preparedness in water-related issues, at the 4th World Water Forum held in Mexico (March 16-22).

CBE, the sole agency from eastern India invited to the global forum, convened a joint session with the authorities of Noord Holland, Zuid Holland and Zealand, in the presence of the respective vice-governors of these provinces, L. Dwarshuis, P. Poelmann and T. Kramer.

?It was a confluence of our academic inputs coupled with indigenous solutions and their sophisticated technology that has kept floods at bay for over 50 years in a country lying way below sea level,? Unmesh Kirtikar, who coordinated the presentation for CBE, told Metro.

The international conclave, with the main theme of ?local action for global challenges?, was attended by over 12,000 delegates. To stress on the power of people?s participation to ensure sustainability, the Calcutta agency did a live project on Rangaberia village in the Sunderbans delta.

?We tried to underline how the tertiary population in the active delta which earlier had only gatherers, has tackled the challenge of salty and brackish water by rainwater harvesting in ponds,? said Kirtikar. He anchored deliberations on behalf of CBE secretary-general Ranajit Gupta in the latter?s absence.

Santosh Ghosh, president of CBE, who was the co-convenor along with Dutch vice-minister for water and public works M. Schulz van Haegen, did another presentation titled ?Water supply in Calcutta ?scarcity to plenty?, as part of the session ?Water challenges and perspectives in megacities?.

His topic was the gap between plans and reality in the city?s water supply system. The session was organised in collaboration with the ministry of water in the Mexican government and chaired by Felipe Arreguin Cortes.

Noting that abundance of water due to naturally high rainfall doesn?t guarantee access to the resource and adequate sanitation, he highlighted challenges. These included pockets of water scarcity due to the population boom, receding aquifer levels, water wastage and lack of synergies between water, land-use and environment planning. He also called for integrated planning for megacities that takes into account environmental, social and development aspects.

The third representative from CBE, Ranjini Gupta, also assistant town planner in the state government, conducted a presentation on urban agriculture in collaboration with IRDC, Canada. Her paper dealt with management of wastewater and treating it at a low cost ? as a best-practice case study to be replicated in Africa.

? Subhro Saha