What do rivers mean to you?
For Hugo Costa, deep in the Amazon, the seasons of the Juruá River can define the food you eat, the journeys you travel, and the people you meet. For Yolarnie Amepou, looking over a vast river delta in Papua New Guinea, ten different cultures have been shaped by the same river which runs 400 kilometres from the highlands down into the sea. For Siziwe Mota, Africa’s rivers are a source of survival, relied upon for food, jobs, spiritual practices, climate, and biodiversity.
On 17 May, Synchronicity Earth held a conversation between these three freshwater conservationists about the importance of their rivers, the challenges they face in safeguarding them, and the opportunities there are to protect them.
“Rivers signify connectivity. No matter the distance, what happens at the top of the river impacts the bottom. Any blockage in the middle impacts this connection. No matter the diversity across the basin, the river represents connectivity and interdependence.”
Yolarnie Amepou
These connections are at the heart of understanding how to preserve freshwater biodiversity. Despite our three speakers representing three different continents, they each spoke to how their waters impacted every aspect of life and culture, and as a result, how intersectional their approaches to preserving their rivers must be.
The panel was introduced by Dr Ian Harrison, the freshwater specialist at Conservation International’s Moore Center for Science, co-chair of the IUCN Freshwater Conservation Committee, and adviser to both Synchronicity Earth and SHOAL.
The average abundance of 6,617 freshwater populations across the globe, representing 1,398 species, declined by 83 per cent from 1970 to 2018. Source: WWF/ZSL (Living Planet Report 2022).
“There’s not much freshwater on Earth… only about 2.5 per cent of all the water on Earth is freshwater, and it covers less than one per cent of our planet’s surface. But despite that… around 10 per cent of known species rely on freshwater habitats for survival.”
Ian Harrison
As the geographic and cultural connection across land, across borders, the importance of freshwater habitats from rivers and lakes to swamps and springs far outstrips their size.
The challenges facing freshwater
However, Ian summarised the status of freshwater biodiversity in three statistics:
- A third of wetlands have declined from 1970 to 2015.
- Freshwater vertebrates have declined by an average of 83 per cent.
- 20 per cent of freshwater species are threatened by extinction.
“This obviously isn’t very encouraging,” said Ian. “We are facing a biodiversity crisis. But I think that certainly doesn’t mean that we should give up hope. In fact, I would say quite the reverse, we have some very strong opportunities for ensuring that freshwater ecosystems are better included.”
And who better to ask about how to protect freshwater ecosystems than the people living alongside them? As Hugo said,
“Nobody will better protect Amazonia than the people who live there.”
Hugo Costa
Hugo Costa works in the Juruá River basin, one of the longest tributaries of the Amazon which has many ox-bow lakes. Image: Hugo Costa
Hugo is the finance director and scientific research coordinator at Instituto Juruá, Brazil. He has been working for the past 13 years in the Juruá River basin, where he coordinates the development of research supporting the effective and equitable management of natural resources by communities.
“In the Juruá, as in the entire Amazon Basin, the greatest challenge is the fight against illegal activities- fishing, mining, logging,” says Hugo. “These are now widespread thanks to the last government of Brazil, as are land grabs from people driving these activities, who are taking land from Indigenous Peoples and other traditional communities who have lived in the Amazon for centuries.
“There has also been historical governmental support for environmentally damaging developments such as dams and roads. These decisions are the result of top-down decision-making where local people are often neglected even though they are the ones living with the consequences.”
Just as in the Amazon, the growing interest in hydropower as a ‘green solution’ is driving dam developments in Africa as well.
Siziwe Mota is the Africa programme director at International Rivers, who has worked on environmental, social justice, and human rights issues, particularly supporting communities impacted by extractive industries and engaging with policymakers on energy justice.
