With the launch of Blue Gold, the European Water Partnership (EWP) is creating a communication platform for the EWP, its members, the European water community, stakeholders and those interested in water at large.
Blue Gold is in important tool in achieving EWP's mission to be an action-oriented forum for all stakeholders including local, national and European governmental agencies, knowledge institutes, business, non-governmental organizations, public and private financial institutions, end-users and civil society groups. It constitutes a platform for exchanging views, finding solutions for water challenges in wider Europe and stimulating cooperation and partnerships.
Blue Gold is an extension of the EWP's mandate to be an open and independent forum to discuss innovative management, technological and financial solutions for funding of water-related projects and developing new procurement approaches, stimulate cooperation between members, put water on the mainstream political and media agenda, improve awareness among policy makers and in the business community of the urgent need to confront water challenges, promote the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals in wider Europe and through an EU neighborhood policy for water and the Horizon 2020 programme for the Mediterranean and independently contribute to EU platforms related to water such as the Water Framework Directive, the CIS Process and WSSTP, and promote technological and managerial innovation.
Although moderated by James M. Dorsey, a EWP Advisory Board member and Chairman of Quest Ltd, Blue Gold welcomes contributions from all. Blue Gold invites and urges contributors to see the blog as much more than a simple bulletin board. Beyond being a source of information, Blue Gold is a discussion platform in which all water-related opinions, experiences, impressionistic comments on conferences and publications and water-related diary-like comments and entries are shared and exchanged. It serves as a platform to generate and float ideas. This is not to say that Blue Gold is disinterested in your news. On the contrary, we are interested and encourage you to share your news with us. But we also urge you to share much more: your thinking, your views, your experiences, your irreverent comments. Please also contribute water-related press publications and audio visual materials as well as other water-related publications with or without your comments. Contributions can be sent to j.dorsey@ewp.eu.
We see blogging for what it is: a tool to build and enhance a community in which everyone has a voice; a platform or medium in which communication is often more informal, more personal and opinionated and perhaps at times more spontaneous than in traditional media. Blogging gives everyone access as well as an equal voice. It also can be immediate: you can contribute on the go from your mobile phone or from behind your PC. Visuals are as welcome as text. You can subscribe to our RSS feed, visit our website or get this blog on your mobile device.
We invite EWP member organizations and all those with water-related websites and or blogs to link to our blog and to link Blue Gold to your sites. The more links, the broader the circle for which Blue Gold can serve as the European water community's first truly universal communication platform accessible to any and everyone with a stake and something to say about water.
So, welcome, blog away. It is upon all of us to make Blue Gold the water community's crucial, informative and lively communication platform. We look forward to engaging with you on Blue Gold.
James M. Dorsey