Today is World Water Day!

World Water Day is brought to you by the United Nations to remind us that over 1 billion people don't have access to clean water. It's staggering to think that nearly 4,000 kids die every day as a result. [1]

And this got me thinking… A lot of us have water restrictions affecting out gardening or our shower time, but these savings aren't even a drop in the ocean compared with what is used in the meat and dairy industries every day.

When I was at uni, we went to a cattle feedlot in Tungali in rural SA. I nearly fell over when the guide told me that in summer, a cow can drink up to 80 litres of water in a day. There were 3,000 thirsty cows jammed into this feedlot! That's almost a quarter of a million litres of water used a day just so people can eat unhealthy hamburgers made from the bodies of unfortunate cows in just one of the many feedlots across Oz.

Now while I wait for you to find your feet again, I'll let you in on some other scary stats:

• To produce just one kilo of chicken meat takes 3,500 litres of water. [2]
• To produce a kilo of beef takes 100,000 litres! [2]
• And wait for it … over 12% of all the water used in the world is used to produce … milk! [3] Yep, dairy is undoubtedly the biggest guzzler of water in the world (not to mention one of the cruellest industries to boot)

So, if you're serious about saving water, you could refuse to shower for an entire year, let your garden dry up into a dust patch, and never ever wash the car. OR, you could join me to go vegan and reward yourself with some amazingly delicious cruelty-free food!

How will you be saving water on World Water Day (and every other day)?

Refs
[1] who.int/water_sanitation_health/2005advocacyguide.pdf
[2] unleashed.org.au/change_the_world/go_veg/environment.php
[3] water.gov.au/WaterUse/Agriculturalwateruse/index.aspx?Menu=Level1_4_4

I think I've just found my new favourite cartoon! This brilliant illustration was sent to us by the insightful and very talented Donn Pattenden (thanks Donn!).

This is one issue that really stirs me up. The meat and dairy industries are huge water guzzlers. The UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation estimates that one glass of milk takes roughly 200 litres of water to produce. That's almost 3 days worth of showers! But that's nothing compared to the 100,000 litres of water that David Pimentel, a water resource specialist, says is required to produce just 1 kilo of beef!

In a country as dry as Australia, this sort of squandering of water just doesn't make sense. I live in Brisbane, where water shortages are a real threat (just like many of our other cities). We've been told to keep our domestic water usage below 140L of water per person per day...

I'm all for water conservation at home. In fact, we've just installed a new rain water tank :-) ... but when 70% of global water usage is for agriculture, it seems like what we eat and drink would be a smart place for us to start looking at how we can save water.