Eating more vegetables can save water.
There is a difference between direct water use and indirect water use.
“Direct water use is the water you use for your own personal needs like washing, laundry, cooking and indirect water use refers to how much water we use to produce the items we use or eat every day,” says Harry the hominid.
The foods we eat often have a high water footprint because a lot of water is used to grow the plants.
It takes only 180 litres of water to produce a kilogram of tomatoes, 100 litres of water per kilogram of potatoes but it takes 2 400 litres of water to make a 100g bar of chocolate and 16 000 litres of water just to produce one kilogram of beef.
“So if we eat less meat and more vegetables, we save water,” says Harry.
To celebrate National Water Week (SA) Harry suggests these water-saving
tips:
. Try to eat more vegetables and less meat.
. Take shorter showers.
. Fix dripping taps and toilets.
. Collect rain water and grey water (dirty bath-and dishwater) and use that instead to irrigate the garden.
“If we all try to save water there will be more water to go around and no one will be left thirsty.
“Let’s work together to keep our water footprint as small as possible,” says Harry.
