Cape Town : Day Zero - learning the lessons from a city's water crisis

As part of London Climate Action Week, the Resilience Shift hosted a film screening of interviews with a number of Cape Town’s leaders from government, private sector, academia and civil society reflecting on how their city narrowly avoided running out of water. This provided the basis for a panel discussion on the lessons that London and other cities can draw from Cape Town’s water crisis. n the lead up to April 12, 2018 – ‘Day Zero’ when the city was projected to run out of water – all of Cape Town’s residents learned many hard lessons about managing and conserving their water, changing usage behaviour, communication and working in partnership to respond to a crisis. Those involved in the city-wide response to ‘Day Zero’ were asked to share their stories as part of an innovative film project, the Cape Town Drought Response Learning Initiative (CTDRLI), led by Peter Willis of Conversations that Count, and the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, and Victor van Aswegen, Director, CineSouth Studios. The Resilience Shift brought Peter Willis together with three panellists to reflect on the preparedness of London and cities in southeast England to cope with a water crisis. In her role as the City Resilience Officer for London, Dr. Fiona Twycross provided the perspective of local government while Trevor Bishop, Director, Water Resources South East (WRSE), provided the water utilities’ point of view. From his work leading the City Water Resilience Approach, Martin Shouler reflected on the global value of these filmed interviews. Jo da Silva, Acting Director Resilience Shift, introduced the evening, whose aim was to share the powerful lessons from Cape Town, and to trigger reflection and conversation about the content of the film and its relevance for others. Juliet Mian, Technical Director Resilience Shift, closed the event on behalf of the Resilience Shift. See more at https://www.resilienceshift.org/activ... The Resilience Shift has collaborated with the Cape Town Drought Response Learning Initiative to develop film-based learning modules based on interviews with Capetonians about their learning from the water crises. These learning modules are available on www.resilienceshift.org In the preparation of this event highlights film we would like to thanks Peter Willis and Victor van Aswegen from the Cape Town Drought Response Learning Initiative and to the interviewees featured in this short highlights film: Priya Reddy, George Gabriel, Claire Pengelly, Dr Kevin Winter, Andrew Boraine, and Craig Kesson, as well as panellists Trevor Bishop, Dr Fiona Twycross, and Martin Shouler and audience members Dr David Rubin, and Fendi Lin.