TANNARA YELLAND
Associate News Editor
If a group of University of Saskatchewan graduate students have their way, the sale of bottled water on campus could be on its way out.
Shannon Dyck, who was the University of Saskatchewan Students’ Union vice-president student affairs from 2008-09, is currently part of an initiative called Better than Bottled Water, which seeks to promote information about bottled and tap water on campus. Earlier in the school year they had been working to have bottled water sales banned on campus, but had been met with some apprehension.
“We don’t use that word,” Dyck said of “banning” bottled water. “That definitely created a lot of negative feedback.”
“I think it kind of misrepresents what we’re trying to do,” said Colleen George, who is also involved.
The group refocused and now exists primarily to educate students, though the word “ban” made a few more appearances in the group’s discussion.
The University of Winnipeg banned bottled water on its campus, and according to Dyck, they held a referendum on what to do. Dyck, George and Emily Heffring said they would support a referendum at the U of S, but that it would have to be presented by the USSU or the Graduate Students’ Association.
“Maybe down the road the governing bodies of the students can put forward a referendum,” said Dyck. “We’re more of an educational advocacy group.”
The group had a booth in the Arts Tunnel on March 22 to raise awareness of World Water Day, and played the film Blue Gold in St. Emmanuel Chad that afternoon. Before the film, Alina Siegfried spoke about the challenge she has undertaken to use only 25 litres of water per day.
“It’s just during March,” Siegfried said with a laugh. “This is not a permanent lifestyle choice.”
The average Canadian uses almost 330 litres of water in a day, says Siegfried. Even Saskatoon’s average, a much lower 240 litres per day, is almost 10 times higher than the limit Siegfried has set for herself.
Somewhat surprisingly, Siegfried has not had much trouble meeting her goal.
“I’ve gone over a couple of days, but I’ve gone significantly under on most days. So I’ve got about 50 litres of water banked right now, which will come in handy when I do laundry again.”
Siegfried works as a Water Issues Coordinator with the Saskatchewan Environmental Society and so she has been interested in and involved with water conservation for some time. She was turned on to the 25-litre challenge by a Facebook group for Kevin Freedman, who did the challenge last June.
“He was looking for more people to do it along with him in March, and I think there are 10 of us all together.”
As signalled by her presence at the film screening, Siegfried supports the Better than Bottled Water campaign. She feels there are still places where it is appropriate to have bottled water, at least while not all Canadians have access to clean water.
“At this stage,” she said, “one in six people on reserves doesn’t have access to clean drinking water, and that’s a huge figure”¦. So bottled water does have its place still, but not in places like this. Not on campus. Not in the city.”
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photo: Robby Davis