Water Stress Poses Huge Risks for Companies: These Tools Can Help
Water stress is a
perennial problem, and is only projected to worsen with climate change. One of the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) related to
water is to “ensure sustainable withdrawals and supply of freshwater to address water scarcity and substantially reduce the number of people suffering from water scarcity” by 2030.
It’s a lofty goal, especially considering every continent already faces some level of water stress. Further, in order to have any hope of reaching that goal, public and private stakeholders alike must fully commit to action. Corporations, in particular, will need to address water use, at every stage of the process.
Overview
World Water Day 2021 focuses on the value of water, highlighting its importance from multiple angles, including cultural, environmental, economic, and financial. This session will be separated into two sections. In the first section, corporate leaders will discuss what “water means to the business sector,” and why it should be prioritized in business decision making. In the second section, two practical tools will be introduced to help companies advance water stewardship practices, in conjunction with case examples of companies who have already used these tools.
The duration of this session is 90 minutes:
Section 1: Building Resilience from Global to Local – The Importance of the Value of Water (45 mins)
Microsoft On the Issues
One year ago, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, President Brad Smith and CFO Amy Hood announced Microsoft’s bold commitment to be carbon negative by 2030 and to remove our historic emissions by 2050. This was the beginning of Microsoft raising the bar on our sustainability ambitions and culminating with a set of commitments for Microsoft to be carbon negative, water positive, zero waste, and protect more land than it uses by 2030. We are also building a Planetary Computer platform to transform the way the world monitors, models, and manages Earth’s natural systems.
Today, Brad shared our annual progress report on our sustainability work. He writes in his blog: We have gotten straight to work. We have reduced, we have removed, and we have learned a lot of lessons along the way. Importantly we have not done this alone – we have worked with suppliers, customers, competitors, partners, governments, and employees to make progress. The deep detail