Tackling water mismanagement.

Every year, since 1993, the United Nations has celebrated World Water Day on March 22nd to advocate for the sustainable management of freshwater resources. This year, the theme is accelerating change to raise awareness and solve water: related issues.

Acceleration of change in a country such as Pakistan is direly needed where the mismanagement of water resources is wreaking havoc on the environment and the economy. The matter is of particular concern within the agriculture sector. According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), more than 90 percent of the freshwater is used in the agriculture sector. Alarmingly, approximately 50 percent of this water is wasted due to inefficient practices such as flood irrigation. For a country that is at the forefront of climate change, battling droughts and floods, despite contributing a negligible amount of global carbon emissions, such kind of mismanagement is simply not viable. A burgeoning population and rapid urbanisation further exacerbate the problem.

These water: related challenges are a shared problem-these affect the people, the businesses, the economy and the government. These also require all stakeholders to come together to solve issues. Presently, corporations are at the forefront of fighting against the mismanagement of water resources. There is an increasing realisation that they have a corporate social responsibility, not only when it comes to the social side, but also towards the environment. For example, the country's top: notch multinationals are helping conserve water by improving water use efficiency in their direct agricultural supply chain and manufacturing operations, replenishing water for communities, and adopting water stewardship to ensure on: site water efficiency.

An example is Nestle Pakistan, which realises the importance of working beyond its factory gates and taking collective action, with other partners such as the government, communities, farmers, civil society and academia. Water has been a key focus of Nestle's decades: long legacy and building on its existing strong water stewardship foundation, it introduced a new commitment called the Water Pledge, in August 2021. With this Nestle aims to conserve more water than what its Waters Business uses in its operations throughout the local watersheds. It aims to do this by taking collective action with local communities, farmers in the value chain and experts in water resource management. Using...