Water is key - photo essay

Although deceptively beautiful, these images do not all tell a positive story. More than a billion people are without safe water. When safe water is available, entire village economies change and the lives of the inhabitants are transformed from disease and malnutrition to hope and success. In these images, so intimately composed, photo-journalist Gil Garcetti portrays life in West Africa and the consequences of living with and without safe water. Garcetti was deeply touched as he traveled throughout Niger, Ghana, Mali, and Burkina Faso, interviewed villagers and saw first-hand what water means to these elegant peoples. He was motivated to bring the story to a wider audience and to initiate, through his photographs, a call to action to the industrialized world to co-work in these and other countries to help to ensure improved water resource management for the short and long-term future of all societies. Please visit www.balconypress.com for more information about this book. Garcetti, G. 2007. Water is Key. Balcony Press, Glendale, CA. ISBN 978-1-890449-26-1.