/ 22 March 2000

ASMAL SCOOPS INTERNATIONAL WATER AWARD

EDUCATION Minister Kader Asmal has won the 2000 Stockholm Water Prize for his “visionary” leadership in water resource management, the prize committee announced on Wednesday. Asmal, a former minister for water affairs and forestry, was awarded the prize “in recognition of his unprecedented efforts in the development of vision, legislation and practice in the field of water management in South Africa.”. The committee praised the steps Asmal took in the mid-1990s to address South Africa’s water problems, saying that in doing so he “went back to his roots, ensuring that policies and practices were anchored in human rights, social justice and environmental sustainability.”