Heritage & Heroes

How Visionary
Pioneers Created a
Global Water Network

By Paul Reiter, Gustaf Olsson, Helmut Kroiss

Two groups of leading water scientists, practitioners and engineers, concerned deeply about the human and ecological health of the world’s freshwater resources, formed the International Water Supply Association (IWSA) in 1947 and, shortly thereafter, the International Association on Water Pollution Research (IAWPR) in 1962-65. Both organizations were formed entirely by their own members’ actions. From their inception, they were intended to be self-managed and self-funded – a fact that remains true more than 75 years later.