Let us turn the world blue!

Welcome to the global network of Blue Communities.

The Blue Community comprises cities and municipalities, universities and schools, water & sanitation services and other public institutions, professional associations, faith-based organisations and labour unions, NGOs, and prominent water and sanitation experts. They have united to protect our water as a human right, to defend it against pollution and profiteering, and to promote safe drinking water for all and everywhere in order to end bottled water and plastic pollution.

We invite you to explore these pages:

Learn about the Blue Values, the core pledges of the Blue Community.
Find all the Blue Communities worldwide on our Blue World map and find your Blue Community in the chapter (by region) or cluster (by type).
Meet the Blue Community Ambassadors and read the statements of Blue Community activists.
Check out the BLUE NEWS for daily updates on Blue Communities around the world and with a daily BLUE DIGEST, listing and linking the most important articles on water and sanitation from media outlets in English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish.
We also encourage you to join one of our social media channels to stay updated and in touch with the Blue Community.

And if your municipality, institution or organisation is not a Blue Community yet, join in, TURN BLUE!

Your Blue Team

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«The Blue Community is an international reference in the defence of the human right to drinking water and sanitation. Blue Communities are an example of solidarity between trade unions, religious organisations, social movements and institutions such as universities and municipalities, in the defence of water as a common good, accessible to all but not appropriated by anyone; in the defence of water as the blue soul of life and the basis for coexistence in communities and societies.»

Pedro Arrojo-Agudo, UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights to safe drinking water and sanitation

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«Welcome to this exciting new website. The Blue Communities movement is committed to protecting water as a human right and a public trust, not to be commodified and put on the open market like oil and gas. Thinking “blue” also means that we have to stop seeing water as a resource for economic growth and profit, and start understanding that water is the sacred source of all life. It is my dream that the Blue Communities movement will touch hearts and minds all over the world and protect Mother Earth and future generations forever.»

Maude Barlow, activist, author, co-founder of the Blue Communities movement.

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«The Blue Community initiative is a reconnection of Africans to their culture of sharing and collective ownership of water as a free gift from God. The modern threat of privatisation and over-commercialisation of this resource must be resisted collectively, and the expansion of Blue Communities is one way of doing this.»

Reverend Kolade Fadahunsi, minister of Methodist Church Nigeria, currently serving as the Director of the Christian Council of Nigeria, Institute of Church and Society Ibadan. Rev. Fadahunsi is a commissioner of the World Council of Churches, Commission on International Affairs, as well as the Regional Coordinator of the Ecumenical Water Network Africa.

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«The World Council of Churches WCC and its Ecumenic Water Network EWN is fully committed to spread the notion of Blue Communities and encourage hundreds of thousands of its related churches and Faith Based Organisations to become Blue Communities. We are strongly committed to 'Water for Life, over water for Profit'. Let us all become Blue Communities. »

Dinesh Suna, based in Geneva is the Coordinator of Ecumenical Water Network of World Council of Churches, since 2012. He is also the Co-lead of the Water, Environment and Climate Action workstream of PaRD, Germany, and a member of the Blue Team running this website (see his full statement there).

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«Water is everywhere and connects everything, including us humans with everything that surrounds us. It is the basis of our lives and we need to protect it and make it accessible to everyone. Access to water and sustainable (waste) water management is something I am also committed to professionally. Through Blue Communities, I can network and work with other stakeholders to contribute to the human right to water and sanitation.»

Dorothee Spuhler, OST Eastern Switzerland University of Applied Science, UMTEC Institute for Environmental and Process Engineering, Project Manager Global Cooperation, Adapted Water Technologies & Systems SuSanA (Sustainable Sanitation Alliance), Eawag and Board Member VaLoo.

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«It is urgent to affirm waters as a divine gift, human right and common good. To this end, Blue Universities contribute greatly, encouraging reflection and action that promote universal access to drinking water. Blue Universities promote social and environmental justice through water justice.»

Elias Wolff, Professor at the Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Paraná, Brazil, has a doctorate in Theology and a master's degree in Philosophy, working specifically on the themes of interreligious dialogue and ecumenism. He is a member of the Ecumenical Water Network (World Council of Churches – Geneva), and one of the founders of the Ecumenical Water Network – Brazil.

Meet the Blue Community Ambassadors

Blue Community Network Newsletter

Keep up to date with the latest developments in the Blue Community with the quarterly newsletter of the network, delivered directly to your email inbox every three months.

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Previous newsletters you find here.