Water-Wise Cities through Integrated Planning and Design

For the first time in history, over half of the world’s population is living in cities. By 2050, roughly 6.4 billion people will live in a city. These people will be living in an increasingly water-scarce world at a time when demand for water is projected to increase by 55 per cent by 2050. Rapid population growth, industrialisation, climate change, water pollution, and maintaining, renewing and expanding urban water infrastructure are just some of the unprecedented challenges facing urban water management and systems.

Cities are the future for humanity, but the failure to manage higher population density or climate change can result in a threat to resources – water, energy, food – and have a profound impact on human health and well-being, the environment and the economy.

Water sensitive cities are great places to live, where innovation, social cohesion, creativity and culture flourish. To create sustainable water in cities, all stakeholders need to act to avoid the looming water crisis. We need to share experience and knowledge, and track progress. The Cities of the Future agenda harnesses the power of the IWA network to co-create solutions and join efforts to manage a city’s many waters in a sustainable and resilient manner, an approach endorsed by the IWA Principles for Water-Wise Cities.

The Principles for Water-Wise Cities are a framework to support water and urban professionals implementing the water and cities related Sustainable Development Goals. This framework is extended through the Action Agenda for Basin-Connected Cities articulating how cities can be active water stewards in their wider water basins.