The United Nations issued a report stating that two in three people will face water shortages by 2025. It reports that more than 2.7 billion people will face severe water shortages by the year 2025 if the world continues consuming water at the same rate. The new report released to mark World Water Day in March 2002, says that another 2.5 billion people will live in areas where it will be difficult to find sufficient fresh water to meet their needs. It warns that fierce national competition over water resources has prompted fears that water issues contain the seeds of violent conflict. The looming crisis is being blamed on mismanagement of existing water resources, population growth and changing weather patterns. The areas most at risk from the growing water scarcity are in semi-arid regions of sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. But according to new figures from the UN Economic Commission for Europe at least 120 million people living in Europe - one in seven of the population - still do not have access to clean water and sanitation. The commission is calling for greater effort to be made in the developed world to conserve and protect water resources. The people in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia are most at risk.

The UN body says wasted water is costing Europe around US $10 billion a year. According to the report, by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), an estimated 1.1 billion people have no access to safe drinking water, 2.5 billion lack proper sanitation and more than five million people die from waterborne diseases each year - 10 times the number of casualties killed in wars around the globe. Less than 3% of the Earth's water is fresh and most of it is in the form of polar ice or too deep underground to reach. The amount of fresh water that is accessible in lakes, rivers and reservoirs is less than a quarter of 1% of the total. "Even where supplies are sufficient or plentiful, they are increasingly at risk from pollution and rising demand," UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said. There are fears that future competition for water could spark conflicts. People will be forced from their homes to seek water. "Fierce national competition over water resources has prompted fears that water issues contain the seeds of violent conflict," Mr Annan said. The IAEA is calling for the launch of a "blue revolution" to conserve water supplies and develop new ones. "The simple fact is that there is a limited amount of water on the planet, and we cannot afford to be negligent in its use. We cannot keep treating it as if it will never run out," the IAEA's director, Mohamed El-Baradei, said. See the full story at the website http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/newsid_1887000/1887451.stm

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reports that the Near East nations are facing a drought and water shortages. While it did not make the link to global warming, it appears to be playing a factor. FAO issued the warning at its 26th Regional Conference for the Near East held March 12 in Tehran, Iran. FAO adds that while such efforts are essential for the fight against drought, regional and international cooperation is also needed as a follow-up to the International Convention on Combatting Desertification and Drought (June 1994). The FAO also calls on Near East governments to establish a "Drought Watch and Early Warning System"and to support a recently launched Drought Information Network for the Near East and the Mediterranean. In the fight against drought, the UN specialized agency stresses the need to adopt a "participatory approach" by closely involving communities at grass-root level, including non-governmental organizations (NGOs), women and youth, in the formulation and the implementation of national policies and programmes.

During the last 20 years, many countries of the FAO Near East Region, which includes 29 States extending from the Atlantic Ocean to Central Asia, have experienced long-term droughts, sometimes lasting more than a year. Most affected were Afghanistan, the Islamic Republic of Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Morocco, Pakistan, Syria and Sudan. Successive droughts had devastating consequences on plant, animal and human lives in several Near East countries. The FAO reports that drought, land degradation and desertification trigger famine, poverty, civil unrest and sometimes war. Droughts also seriously affected ecosystems and biodiversity. For example, in the Islamic Republic of Iran, many internationally known wetlands and lakes, such as the Hamoun wetland, became completely dry. In Sudan, traditional and indigenous crop varieties, which constitute the staple food for people in dry regions, were threatened by extinction. Some 70 percent of the agricultural areas in the Near East Region are arid or semi-arid. Only 20 percent of the total lands are cultivable.

The most serious challenge to agriculture is water scarcity: average annual rainfall is 205 mm and while the Region covers 14 percent of the world's surface, its water resources represent only 2 percent of the total internal renewable water resources of the world, says FAO. Among 21 countries that have been declared water-scarce, 12 are in the Near East region and many of them are Mediterranean countries, according to a recent study by the International Programme for Technology and Research in Irrigation and Drainage (IPTRID) in collaboration with FAO. "Despite water shortages, misuse of water is widespread and farmers use large amounts of water poorly," the study says. A case study on Jordan shows that the use of improved drip irrigation saved 20-50 percent of water, increasing cucumber and tomato crop yields by 15-20 percent. In Morocco, new irrigation technology (laser-levelled basin irrigation) resulted in water savings of 20 percent and cereal crop-yield increases of 30 percent. "Poor implementation and management, however, have seriously limited expected water savings and increased productivity," according to the IPTRID study. For further information, contact FAO information officer Michael, Hage Tel (00982 9112495495) in Tehran, ph. 09 211495495, email michael.hage@fao.org . Visit their website at http://www.fao.org then click on FAO regional conferences 2002.

The U.S. Congressional Environment and Public Works Committee (EPW) time held hearings February 26, 2002, on Bill S. 1961, the Water Investment Act (S. 1961). The Bill was put forth by four co-sponsors including, Sen. Jeffords (I-Vermont), Sen. Crapo (R-Idaho), Sen. Graham (D-Florida), and Sen. Smith (R-New Hampshire). The bill would provide additional funding for the State Revolving Loan programs and provide administrative provisions to the water funding program. The legislation is also an attempt to "update and modernize" the Clean Water Act. S. 1961 authorizes US $35 billion over 5 years split between both the Clean Water State Revolving Loan Fund (SRF) and the Drinking Water SRF. The Clean Water SRF would be funded at $20 billion, while the Drinking Water SRF is funded at $15 billion beginning in Fiscal Year (FY) 2002. The legislation would allow states the flexibility to transfer funds from the Clean Water SRF to the Drinking Water SRF if necessary, and vice-versa. The details of the legislation include: Funds for construction of treatment work, implementation of non-point source programs, development of estuary programs. Projects that use 1 or more nontraditional approaches will be eligible to receive assistance. Requires projects to be reviewed by State. The message throughout the hearing was clear, that while supporters were certainly pleased to see the Senate addressing vast water infrastructure needs, there are serious concerns about the restrictions placed on the dollars. Local government officials believe S. 1961 needs to be significantly streamlined to direct the bill's funds to support basic infrastructure repair, replacement, and compliance with costly regulatory requirements needs. The legislation should focus on the water and wastewater infrastructure crisis. There is no need to make it more difficult for local government to have access to these funds. For more information contact Heather A. McTavish, Government Relations Coordinator, American Public Works Association - Washington, DC , ph. (202) 408-9541, Ext. 3010, Visit their website at http://www.apwa.net/govtaffairs .

A looming water crisis could threaten one in three people by 2025, sparking as much conflict this century as oil did in the last, the U.N.-sponsored Third World Water Forum said in a statement. Governments must urgently find new ways to conserve shrinking water supplies amid rising demand, forum participants - including leading scientists and environmentalists - were told on the opening day of the week-long conference. The statement said about 450 million people in 29 countries already suffered from water shortages and that Asia and sub-Saharan Africa - both heavily populated - would face the most severe problems. The Middle East, India, Pakistan and China would also struggle with serious water shortages in coming years unless opposing groups of environmental and agricultural scientists can agree on how to tackle water use, the forum said. "Water could become the new oil as a major source of conflict," Dutch Crown Prince Willem- Alexander, patron of the 1999 World Water Forum, told Reuters in an interview after delivering the opening speech in Stockholm. "Increasing scarcity, competition and arguments over water in the first quarter of the 21st century will dramatically change the way we value and use water and the way we mobilize and manage water resources," Willem-Alexander said. Environmentalists are lobbying for a 10 percent cut in water use to protect rivers, lakes and wetlands on which millions of people depend for their livelihoods. Agricultural scientists say farm water use, especially irrigation, should be boosted by 15-20 percent over 25 years to secure food supplies and battle famine. For example, China's loss of agricultural production due to pollution amounts to about $160 million annually, the forum said, adding that it was unlikely traditional agriculture could feed the world's population in 2025. The forum is made up of 10 international organizations such as the World Health Organisation, the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and UNEP, the United Nations Environment Program. Source, "World Water Crisis Will Threaten One in Three-UN, Reuters News Service, Stockholm, August 13, 2001.

Water: The GOLD of our future.... -Stan and Holly


THE GALLON ENVIRONMENT LETTER
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Vol. 6, No. 7, April 13, 2002