United Nations Man and Educational, Scientific and the biosphere Cultural Organization Programme For life, for the future Para la vida, para el futuro Water - a key element in UNESCO biosphere reserves Experiences from a collaboration of Danone Waters Germany and UNESCO Pour la vie, pour l’avenir Für das Leben, für die Zukunft Water - a key element in UNESCO biosphere reserves. Experiences from a collaboration with Danone Waters Germany - a key element in UNESCO biosphere reserves. Experiences from a collaboration with Danone Waters Water Edited by the German Commission for UNESCO For life, for the future Para la vida, para el futuro Water - a key element in UNESCO biosphere reserves Experiences from a collaboration of Danone Waters Germany and UNESCO Pour la vie, pour l’avenir Für das Leben, für die Zukunft Edited by the German Commission for UNESCO Water - a key element in UNESCO biosphere reserves Experiences from a collaboration of Danone Waters Germany and UNESCO Publisher: German Commission for UNESCO (DUK), Colmantstrasse 15, 53115 Bonn, Germany With financial support from the German Federal Ministry for the Environment (BMU) and the Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN) Chief Editor: Dr. Lutz Möller (DUK) With support from: Benjamin Hanke, Bernadette Zyla, Sonja Harms, Laura Lubinski (DUK) The Chief Editor is responsible for the choice and the presentation of the facts contained in this book and for the opinions expressed therein, which are not necessarily those of UNESCO and do not commit the Organization. Layout: DUK Print: druckbombe.de Print run: 2.000 ISBN: 978-3-940785-33-6 The German National Library registers this publication in the German National Bibliography. Detailed bibliographic data may be found on the Internet under http://dnb.d-nb.de. It is permitted to copy, distribute and display the contents of this publication, with the exception of photos, for non-commercial purposes on the condition that the name of the publisher is mentioned and that the original publication of the German Commission for UNESCO is referred to. In case of proces- sing this publication, these license terms have to be notified and imposed as well to the addressees. All contents of this publication with the exception of photos for which all rights are reserved are published under Creative Commons license Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Germany CC BY-NC 3.0. Cover picture: © Steve Wall (Flickr CC) Bonn 2011. This publication is printed on chlorine-free bleached paper. Table of contents Executive summary 4 What we have learnt: Partner statements 6 Biosphere reserves and water 10 The partnership 18 Summaries of projects funded 22 Biosphere reserves are model sites for sustainable development. Livelihoods often depend on water, such as in the biosphere reserve Heath and Pond Landscape of Upper Lusatia. (© Ralf M. Schreyer) Executive summary Using the water resources of our UNESCO is a key organization in the planet wisely is one of the central field of freshwater research and trai- challenges for sustainable develop- ning. Among UNESCO’s key assets ment – today and even more in the are its biosphere reserves as model years to come. This is not an „environ- sites for sustainable development. mental issue“ – first of all, managing They are particularly appropriate our water resources sustainably and places to test, evaluate and implement protecting water quality is crucial for innovative strategies in freshwater. human beings and society. In 2010, access to water of adequate quantity In order to facilitate new approaches and quality has been acknowledged as and also in order to mobilize finan- a human right. Yet, climate change is cial resources, the German biosphere and will increasingly be felt by human reserves have numerous partnerships beings mostly because water is beco- with the private sector. Over the last ming scarce; population growth and couple of years, projects have been rising living standards add to the stress supported by enterprises such as on our already scarce and precious Honda, Commerzbank, Merck, – and water resources. by Danone Waters Germany. 4 Danone Waters Germany is the subsi- taking sustainability seriously, and that diary of the water division of Danone, the cooperation builds on authentic a multinational company with leading corporate strategies, not on marketing. brands in dairy products, mineral water, baby and medical nutrition. Danone Waters has provided financial In 2008, Danone Waters Germany support so far to ten selected pro- introduced a new sub-brand, called jects in German biosphere reserves. “Volvic Landfrucht”, mineral water Several of these have only started in with a dash of fruit juice. A partner- early 2011; therefore the impact of the ship with German UNESCO biosphere cooperation is still unfolding. reserves, accompanying the launch of this sub-brand, was a straightforward The main part of this brochure consists choice. It allowed explaining to the of presenting these ten projects that German consumer the approach of have been funded over the last three the company to protect the mineral years – with a view to demonstrate water’s source in the French volcanic best practice in water management region of Volvic. Until today, the bott- in biosphere reserve to our partners les of “Volvic Landfrucht” explain on around the globe. The projects have their labels what UNESCO biosphere been chosen from open calls for reserves are, why they are important proposals and thus cover a wide range and which projects are supported by of approaches such as education, Danone Waters. nature conservation as well as testing innovative technical solutions related In April 2008, UNESCO, Danone to freshwater. Waters Germany and the German Commission for UNESCO establis- All of these projects have one thing hed a cooperation agreement for the in common: They are projects that benefit of German biosphere reserves, could hardly have been funded from until the end of 2010. Danone Waters government resources, because of le- Germany also agreed to make particu- gal restrictions or because of political lar efforts in corporate sustainability priorities; at the same time, these pro- during these three years. For example, jects rely on bringing together partners by 2010, all Volvic mineral water was that might not have cooperated under transported from France to Germany different circumstances. by railway instead of trucks. This cooperation also meets all conditions At any rate, the so far brief coope- that the German Commission for ration of UNESCO, Danone Waters UNESCO demands from private part- Germany and the German Commis- ners: That they adhere to the United sion for UNESCO has already had Nations Global Compact, that they an important impact on German have a convincing track record in UNESCO biosphere reserves. 5 The working group for the project at Elbe River Landscape biosphere reserve in Brandenburg, assembling many different partners to improve the water supply to a forest. (© Jochen Purps) What we have learnt: Partner statements Lutz Möller to embrace and enact ten principles German Commission for UNESCO in the fields of human rights, environ- Head of Science, Human Rights mental standards, labor standards, and the fight against corruption. From the first day, we have been enthusiastic about cooperating with Some people claim that the Global Danone Waters Germany. The coope- Compact is not enough. Indeed, it is ration has enabled exciting projects a first step only, but an important and and has reached out to milions of urgently needed first step. At the same consumers. At the same time, it is a time, the Global Compact prepares the real partnership with the corporate ground for more ambitious and maybe world, not a marketing instrument; one day binding corporate codes, the company has convincingly de- along entire supply chains. monstrated real commitment. Before we got started, some had re- Companies such as Danone Waters, servations about being associated to a that cooperate with us, participate in mineral water delivered from France to the ”Global Compact“ of the United Germany. Rebutting such reservations Nations. Thus they voluntarily agree through concrete action, Danone Wa- 6 ters has been improving its approach with the consumer that could not have to sustainability. Today, this mineral been achieved by different means. water is no more transported by “Volvic” and “Volvic Landfrucht” are trucks, but by train, and thus transport predominantly sold in urban retail emissions are considerably reduced. situations, where bottled water is the Danone Waters today also uses more only option to obtain drinking water recycled material in producing bottles - at train stations there is no compe- than three years ago. tition with water from the tab. I have personally seen several train passen- gers studying carefully the informati- on on biosphere reserves on the labels of “Volvic Landfrucht”. No biosphere reserve can afford such massive pub- lic relations – corporate partners can be very effective to this end. A public survey about the opinions of the public at large on biosphere reserves, carried out by Danone, provided very helpful insights as well. At the same time, we are very grateful to Danone Waters Germany for the concrete funds they have provided to We are very satisfied with how our German UNESCO biosphere reser- corporate partner has lived up to its ves. As will be described further in commitments; and we are very happy this publication, the projects that have been and are funded are special in about the other tangible results of the that they would most likely not have partnership. First of all, presenting the been funded from classical govern- One Danone funded project improved water quality in the ment sources. Corporate funds are Wadden Sea with algae and mussels. (© MaRenate) excellently suited in order to enable “unusual processes” – an observation UNESCO biosphere reserves on the confirmed also from other private labels of “Volvic Landfrucht” pro- partnership experiences of the vides a platform of communication German Commission for UNESCO.