Tony Maas

Tony Maas is WWF-Canada’s national advisor on freshwater policy and planning. He will be speaking about how organization can expose, assess, and mitigate their “water risk” at the Canadian Water Summit in Toronto on June 17.

Alixandra Gould: What is the biggest threat facing the health of fresh water in Canada today?

Tony Maas: Just one? A lot of the impact on water resources is very local in nature. But writ large, one factor or challenge that we face, that cuts across anywhere in Canada and the world, is the implications of climate change. Climate change will, in some cases, lead to changes in availability and demand for water. It’s changing the context of water management.

Alixandra Gould: WWF-Canada seeks to reduce demand for fresh water while maintaining strong economies. How exactly do you accomplish that?

Tony Maas: One of the most important ways is by recognizing that money can be made by reducing our use of fresh water — if we’re smart about it. There are a lot of technologies that are based on being more efficient with water resources. Those technologies range from smarter irrigation systems for agriculture to municipal systems where we’re capturing rain water, and systems for treating water quality as well.

Alixandra Gould: You co-authored Changing the Flow: A Blueprint for Federal Action on Freshwater. Can you tell us a bit about that blueprint?

Tony Maas: That blueprint is a very comprehensive look at the many things the federal government can and ought to be doing to complement things at the provincial level where water management is more prominent. But the federal government has some very clear authorities and opportunities to provide for a much more robust water management system across the country. A good example of what the federal government could and should be doing, and seems to me more and more backing away from, is collecting data on water availability and water use. They’re getting a bit better on water use, doing industrial surveys and things like that, but much of the science and monitoring that the fed government used to do is falling by the wayside.

Alixandra Gould: What do you think of charging people more for water? Do you think that would change behavior on a mass scale and create an incentive for people to conserve more?

Tony Maas: Yes, but I don’t think it’s a silver bullet. It’s not qualified. It doesn’t mean that if we raise the price of water everything will be okay. The devil in the details — and it’s not really that devilish at all — is that it’s not about the price necessarily. It’s about how to create the pricing structure to better reflect the value of fresh water. One of the key things is a “life line.” You provide a municipality with a certain amount of water, of good quality, for a very low cost or no cost at all. The first 50-100 litres that come out of your tap each day are free, or very low cost. Then you increase the cost to the user as their water usage rates go up. That’s referred to as an increasing block rate.

Alixandra Gould: Irrigated agriculture accounts for 70 per cent of all water used by humans. How do you reduce the amount of water used on Canadian farms?

Tony Maas: This is one of the things we’re really going to have to bump up against in short order, especially in the breadbasket of this country in the prairies where scarcity this year is a very good example of challenging times. It’s a tiered response. The first is looking to technology — smarter irrigation systems, timed irrigation when it’s required most for the crops to be able to provide a product that’s suitable and desirable for market. The next level of consideration needs to be a bit more forward and must start asking the difficult questions about what are the most productive ways of using the limited water we have available. Of what crops are of higher value that provide a stable, reliable, and reasonable income for farmers that may take less water to grow? Pulse crops in Saskatchewan are being looked at as very valued crops because there’s a growing export market for pulses. That’s lentils and other legumes. They’re being looked at in places like China and India, because their populations are growing beyond their capacity to grow their own. So you may be talking about shifting from irrigating a field of alphalpha to feed to beef as your end product, to shifting more of that to pulse foods that are less water intensive and also provide for good economic opportunities for the economic sector.

Alixandra Gould: It’s your job to advocate WWF-Canada’s positions and perspectives on freshwater in government relations. What have been the biggest challenges you’ve faced?

Tony Maas: At the federal level, there’s largely a hands-off approach. There’s an attitude that it’s not a priority for them. For decades now, the federal government has been deferring to the provinces. What that means is some stuff doesn’t get done because the provinces only have a certain capacity.

Alixandra Gould: Which province has been the most difficult?

Tony Maas: I certainly haven’t advocated governments across the country, but I think there are interesting opportunities right now in B.C. as they go through their water act modernization process. In Ontario, they’re looking at this water opportunities and water conservation act, but the details are still coming. Alberta is certainly a challenging place to work, and it’s been challenging for us. I try to maintain some optimism, but a I do believe that with continuing pressure, particularly when citizens voice their perspectives on this, then we can make moves in ways that reform Alberta water policy that protects water for nature but also provides water for economy.

Alixandra Gould: Beijing aims to reuse 100 percent of its waste water by 2013. Is an effort like this possible in some of Canada’s major cities?

Tony Maas: Well, you’re not talking to an engineer, so I’ll qualify that. So I guess my answer becomes very simple. If a city the scale of Beijing can make that happen, then certainly major cities in Canada could make that happen.

Alixandra Gould: Where should the limited financial resources we have be directed to make the biggest impact possible?

Tony Maas: It depends where you are. In the prairies, the limited resources have to go to looking into how to reform agricultural production in that part of the world, and the water allocation system, in ways that ensure we maintain economic activity but put water back into the South Saskatchewan basin, because it’s dangerously close to drying up. In the great lakes basin, endangered species is one of the greatest concerns.

Alixandra Gould: Peter Gleick of the Pacific Institute in Seattle told National Geographic that we will inevitably solve our water problems. Do you agree?

Tony Maas: You’re making me say I’m an optimist twice in one interview! Yes, I think we will solve it. It’s on us to be pushing our governments to be stepping up. It’s one of the biggest questions of the 21st century.

On May 26, the Conservative government announced the tabling of the Safe Drinking Water for First Nations Act. Brought to the Senate by Indian Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl, the Bill would place the same federal standards for drinking and wastewater on First Nations reserves that are already applied to the rest of the country. As it stands right now, provincial and territorial water regulations don’t extend to reserves, and federal regulators have not stepped in.

The announcement has shone light on a generally ignored issue—water standards on reserves in Canada are far too low.

According to 2008 reports, approximately 2,145 of 89,897 homes on reserves have no water service and 4,668 have no sewage service. Health Canada reported that as of May 31, 2010, 118 reserves lived under boil-water alerts.

Dr. Cynthia Wesley-Esquimaux

“Northern communities are suffering the most when it comes to access to potable water,” said Dr. Cynthia Wesley-Esquimaux, assistant professor of Aboriginal Studies at the University of Toronto and a speaker at the Canadian Water Summit to be held on June 17. “When you force people into housing, because they can no longer access the land because of mining interests and everything else, then that means you have to be able to create a provision for them to access water, but the government hasn’t done that.”

Like so many of the issues surrounding First Nations in Canada, access to safe water can be boiled down to territorial rights. The treaties that were negotiated between First Nations and the Government of Canada in the late 19th and early 20th centuries gave First Nations jurisdiction over their reserves. However, several contemporary land claims have alleged that corporations and townships are infringing upon those treaties, and are polluting water supplies in the process. For example, the Tsuu T’ina Nation and Samson Cree Nation launched a claim regarding Alberta’s Water Management Plan for the South Saskatchewan River Basin, as they felt the Alberta government did not adequately consult with or accommodate them when they began to make development plans. On April 28, that claim was dismissed by the Alberta Court of Appeal.

In addition to lacking proper regulations and infrastructure, Dr. Wesley-Esquimaux explains that the people responsible for operating these water systems often don’t have proper training, causing the water systems to go down with some frequency. The government then has to fly thousands of gallons of water into these remote communities, leading to huge costs. According to 2008 reports, 62 percent of First Nations water operators were not certified.

Dr. Wesley-Esquimaux is wary of getting too excited about Bill S-11. “The biggest barrier has always been the battle between the federal and provincial governments and payment. So we will see what happens. It is a very good start to an age-old problem, and maybe this time it will work. It will definitely need to be watchdogged, though.”