Student Action

A Canadian Student Takes Campus Water Action Abroad

Western Australia – A Canadian student working on her master’s degree at Murdoch University in Perth Western Australia began her anti bottled water campaign in response to the masses of bottled water being consumed around campus. Soon after developing an action plan, the campaign received backing and funding from the Guild of Students. The university is now well on its way to becoming the first University in Australia to creating bottled water-free zones.

Lisa Griffin, founder of the Bottled Water Costs the Earth campaign, was inspired by completing a class assignment of an artistic representation of a sustainability issue. A poster was created with the help of a web design-savvy friend and soon became a useful tool to start moving campus away from the mass consumption of bottled water. The campaign emphasizes the ‘costs’ incurred in the purchase and consumption of bottled water as including an unnecessary cost to your wallet, your health, and the environmental cost to the planet. The Campaign is working hard to enlighten students and faculty that water doesn’t have to cost more than petrol by initiating a back to the tap move and is urging the academic population to think twice before buying a plastic wrapped version of the world’s most precious resource. The campus will be hosting sustainability week from March 30th to April 3rd of which the Friday will be dedicated 100% to water education and campus-wide recognition of the anti bottled water campaign. Throughout the day there will be a stall set up on campus where students can purchase re-usable stainless steel water bottles, a showing of the documentary F.L.O.W with an introductory toast to public water, a tap water taste test challenge, an info booth where students can pick up a campus fountain location map or simply talk to a member of the Sustainability Collective about the issue, and an educational ‘campus water footprint’ display in the centre of campus so students can get a visual perception of what the ‘away’ they throw their bottles to really looks like.

Bottled Water Costs the Earth is soon hoping to create a guidebook that can be distributed to other campuses around the country so that they may easily begin their own battles. “We have already had a huge response” says Lisa, “anti bottled water campaigns seem like the campaign everyone has just been waiting for”. They also hope to get the municipalities involved. Australia consumes about 150 million litres of bottled water every year and each year that consumption increases by roughly 10%. Despite the existence of dissent around the country, campaigns remain sparse and largely unheard. Lisa hopes that the campaign on Murdoch campus will spur a national change, discourage people from buying and drinking bottled water, and instil a greater conscience towards the world’s water. The message is simple, bottled water costs the earth.