The government designated August 1st as the “Day for Water” in 1977. However, how many of us are aware of that?
We often hear people say not to waste water or keep the water clean. Yet, it seems that they do not understand the real situation how serious the problem is.
At my past exhibitions, many people came to me and said followings;
“Well, there are plenty of water” or “the amount or water is far enough that it even cause torrential rains”.
We take water and air so granted and we do not see the shortage of those materials.
Imagine droplets in a water bottle in the middle of dry desert, or the water contaminated by radiation. We may realize the importance of the water only when we face those extreme situations.
For the modern people like us, we only understand what we have right now. Yet, we may be able to realize the importance of the water by comparing from the past.
The population of Japan has doubled in last 70 years. At the same time, however, the amount of the water stays the same. Calculated simple, it is obvious that we have less water per person. Each person flashes at lavatory after a single use, takes a bath and changes the tab water, and does laundry individually… People in the past did not do so each and every time.
Moreover, the use of industrial water has run up according the development even producing chemically contaminated water afterward. We have far less “clean water.”
We can only engage in water-saving seriously by understanding followings: the number of people has gained but the amount of the water has stayed the same.
The earth is called “watery planet”. However, it is predominantly seawater, and only 2.5% is fresh water which human beings can utilize. Furthermore, if groundwater and glacier is set off, we can use only 0.01% of all the water on the earth. Yet, the small amount of water has to support all the living things on the earth.
