International Expo "Water and Sustainable Development"
Agora
Inés Restrepo: “Technology contains the DNA of the society that creates it”
The researcher from Columbia Valley University came to Zaragoza with a package of proposals to put forward solutions for the management of water resources
“Water sustainability in rural communities: advances, experiences and lessons” is the title of the new book in the Words for Water. On this occasion, the researcher Inés Restrepo presented the document. During the nearly two hours that she was in the Agora, she had time to analyse the effects of the projects from the institutions for water management.
“The majority of the technocrats who propose solutions for the rural regions never look any further” was the criticism that Restrepo raised when beginning to evaluate problems in water management in Columbia. This specialist recounted that there are many topics to do with the use of water in the rural regions: farmers are often referred to as wasteful while the reality of the studies shows precisely the opposite. Water consumption in the rural family is some 213 litres per day per person while in the city the figure is 300 litres per day per person. The researcher justified these data by establishing the facts of rural life where “the people are aware that without water it would be necessary to sell their land”.
Regarding how to supply water, Restrepo was surprised that in her country the priority lies in extracting water from underground in one of the wettest places in the world – therefore, she lamented that they are missing out on rain water as a water resource. She also spoke about the treatment of sewage and posed a question: “Why do we use drinking water in the toilet?” In fact, we only really use about 6 litres of drinking water per day. Furthermore, the specific case of the toilet is an example of technology that has not worked in Latin America. Therefore, Inés Restrepo upholds the idea that “technology contains the DNA of the society that creates it”.
This expert said that the water management projects should not just be lineal – from the hierarchy to the beneficiaries. She feels that the system should be circular: that in the creation of a project, the engineer is just as important as the person who lives in the area. The objective is to achieve a change in the outlook so that infrastructures can be constructed that truly help people and provide a service and a way of living together for the communities.
