Protecting Water and Rivers: A Shared Responsibility
Around the world, communities are mobilizing to highlight the importance of preserving living rivers and ensuring access to clean water for everyone. These efforts come together around the International Day of Action Against Dams and for Rivers, Water and Life, a day that emphasizes the essential role of water in sustaining life, ecosystem health, and human well-being.
This day is also an opportunity to reaffirm that affected communities must be able to participate in decisions that influence access to, management of, and protection of this vital resource.
A Movement Born from Affected Communities
The International Day of Action Against Dams and for Rivers, Water and Life originated in Brazil in March 1997, during the first International Meeting of People Affected by Dams. Since then, it has become a global call for the equitable and sustainable management of rivers, as well as for heightened vigilance regarding projects that threaten rivers and waterways.
Such vigilance is especially necessary given that, according to data from ERN (European Rivers Network)—a European non-governmental organization dedicated to protecting rivers—1,249 dams have already been built in areas designated as protected, and more than 500 additional dams are currently planned. ERN conducts awareness and education campaigns to promote sustainable water and river management.
Concrete Actions in Quebec
In Quebec, several organizations are actively working to protect rivers. Fondation Rivières is dedicated to “preserving the natural character of rivers, ensuring public access, and safeguarding water quality for human health and biodiversity.”
Among its key actions:
- Opposing unjustified hydroelectric dams, a struggle that led to the protection of 36 waterfalls from private dam projects nearly 20 years ago;
- Improving water quality through tools such as the discharge ranking, discharge mapping, AuditEAU, and various research studies;
Promoting public access to rivers and lakes, notably through initiatives like the Grand Splash and by supporting citizen-led groups.
Other initiatives are also emerging across Quebec, particularly in Outaouais and the Bas-Saint-Laurent, where awareness, revitalization, and consultation projects bring together citizens, municipalities, agricultural stakeholders, and industry to address water use and protection.
The Commitment of the SNJM to Water as a Human Right
The Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary (SNJM) are fully engaged in this movement for environmental protection and justice. In 2008, they adopted a corporate stand recognizing water as a fundamental human right. This commitment reflects their vision of integral ecology, grounded in respect for human dignity, care for creation, and solidarity with the most vulnerable communities.
The International Day of Action Against Dams and for Rivers, Water and Life thus serves as an invitation to learn, engage, and take action, each in our own way, to protect water—a source of life and an essential common good.