Secretary General at the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA), Mithika Mwenda, has said that negotiators must unite and push loss and damage into a fair and equitable climate deal for Africa’s most vulnerable people.
Secretary General at the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA), Mithika Mwenda. Photo credit: pamaccafrica.blogspot.com
Commenting on the outcome of the recently held climate negotiations in Bonn in Germany, Mwenda remarked that Africa, small island states and the least developed countries at the session unequivocally demanded that ‘loss and damage’ should be a stand-alone pillar of the Paris deal.
He underlined the need to scale up adaptation finance to a level that will help the poor people build resilience because, according to him, “we have not mitigated enough and we have not also created an effective adaptation mechanism, we will be forced to deal with inevitable loss and damage.”
“The Paris deal has to tackle the increasing climate damages, and not just the causes,” he added, pointing out that some actors from the developed countries argue that this proposed loss and damage pillar is not only costly, but that it also brings a lack of clarity into the climate agreement.
His words: “We believe that, the fact that it is costly only goes to reflect the real cost of what others are paying for climate change on a daily basis. People in Africa are losing everything they have worked for during their lives to floods, drought and other catastrophic climate change impacts. The issue of cost should be a catalyst for action to be taken rather than being an obstacle for loss and damage to addressed.
“So far, 58 countries have submitted their INDCs and already it shows that these are inadequate to put the world on a safe path. The negotiations in Bonn have been painfully slow. Time will tell whether the trust built up between facilitators and governments will hold up when the political discussions start. Negotiators must make up for the lost time and narrow down the options as we head towards Paris.
“We welcome the support from the G77 Bloc on loss and damage as a step in the right direction; however we need all parties to commit to see it through as a stand-alone pillar in a fair and equitable global agreement in Paris. We are therefore calling on developed member states to join our movement to push loss and damage into the agreement.”
The study finds that the construction of an expected 78 major new dams in sub-Saharan Africa over the next few years will lead to an additional 56,000 malaria cases annually. It urges future dam projects to consider better disease control measures
Slow-moving water at the Akosombo Dam in Ghana. Photo credit: citifmonline.com
Settlements in close proximity to sizeable dams in Africa such as the Akosombo in Ghana, Kainji in Nigeria, Koka in Ethiopia and Kamburu in Kenya are in grave health danger, a research has revealed.
According to the study, over one million people in sub-Saharan Africa will contract malaria this year because they live near a large dam. The study has, for the first time, correlated the location of large dams with the incidence of malaria and quantified impacts across the region. It finds that construction of an expected 78 major new dams in sub-Saharan Africa over the next few years will lead to an additional 56,000 malaria cases annually.
The research, published in a recent edition of Malaria Journal, has major implications for new dam projects and how health impacts should be assessed prior to construction. Encouraged by the increased volume of international aid for water resource development, sub-Saharan Africa has, in recent years, experienced a new era of large dam construction.
“Dams are at the centre of much development planning in Africa. While dams clearly bring many benefits – contributing to economic growth, poverty alleviation and food security – adverse malaria impacts need to be addressed or they will undermine the sustainability of Africa’s drive for development,” said biologist Solomon Kibret of the University of New England in Australia, the paper’s lead author.
Undertaken as part of the CGIAR Research Programme on Water, Land and Ecosystems, the study looked at 1,268 dams in sub-Saharan Africa. Of these, just under two-thirds, or 723, are in malarious areas. The researchers compared detailed maps of malaria incidence with the dam sites. The number of annual malaria cases associated with the dams was estimated by comparing the difference in the number of cases for communities less than five kilometers from the dam reservoir with those for communities further away. The researchers found that a total of 15 million people live within five kilometers of dam reservoirs and are at risk, and at least 1.1 million malaria cases annually are linked to the presence of the dams.
“Our study showed that the population at risk of malaria around dams is at least four times greater than previously estimated,” said Kibret, noting that the authors were conservative in all their analyses.
The risk is particularly high in areas of sub-Saharan Africa with “unstable” malaria transmission, where malaria is seasonal. The study indicated that the impact of dams on malaria in unstable areas could either lead to intensified malaria transmission or change the nature of transmission from seasonal to perennial.
Previous research has identified increased malarial incidence near major sub-Saharan dams such as the Akosombo Dam in Ghana, the Koka Dam in Ethiopia and the Kamburu Dam in Kenya. But, until now, no attempt has been made to assess the cumulative effect of large dam building on malaria.
Malaria is transmitted by the Anopheles mosquito, which needs slow-moving or stagnant water in which to breed. Dam reservoirs, particularly shallow puddles that often form along shorelines, provide a perfect environment for the insects to multiply. Thus dam construction can intensify transmission and shift patterns of malaria infection. Many other water bodies, including small dams, ponds and natural lakes and wetlands, provide breeding habitat for mosquitoes. In total, there are an estimated 174 million cases of malaria in sub-Saharan Africa per year.
Many African countries are planning new dams to help drive economic growth and increase water security. Improved water storage for growing populations, irrigation and hydropower generation are indeed badly needed for a fast developing continent. But the researchers warn that building new dams has potential costs as well as benefits.
“Dams are an important option for governments anxious to develop,” said Matthew McCartney of the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) and a co-author of the paper. “But it is unethical that people living close to them pay the price of that development through increased suffering and, possibly in extreme cases, loss of life due to disease.”
The study notes that despite growing evidence of the impact of dams on malaria, there is scant evidence of their negative impacts being fully offset.
The authors make recommendations about how the increased malaria risk can be managed. Dam reservoirs could be more effectively designed and managed to reduce mosquito breeding. For instance, one option is to adopt operating schedules that, at critical times, dry out shoreline areas where mosquitoes tend to breed. Dam developers should also consider increasing investment in integrated malaria intervention programs that include measures such as bed net distribution. Other environmental controls, such as introducing fish that eat mosquito larva in dam reservoirs, could also help reduce malaria cases in some instances.
“The bottom line is that adverse malaria impacts of dams routinely receive recognition in Environmental Impact Assessments, and areas around dams are frequently earmarked for intensive control efforts. The findings of our work hammer home the reality that this recognition and effort – well-intentioned though it may be – is simply not sufficient,” said co-author Jonathan Lautze, a researcher at the International Water Management Institute’s office in Pretoria, South Africa. “Given the need for water resources development in Africa, malaria control around dams requires interdisciplinary cooperation, particularly between water and health communities. Malaria must be addressed while planning, designing and operating African dams.”
At the 21st Session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 21) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) slated for December 2015, climate negotiators from all over the world will converge on Paris, where they will deliberate on concrete Co2 emissions reduction plans to be incorporated with total renewable energy road maps geared towards limiting and regulating human activities that could alter the earth.
In reference to pre-industrial period, the world currently warms at 0.8 degree Celsius increase. Unarguably, Nigeria’s resultants version of the increase have been in the form of desert encroachment in the North, temperature rise, and erosion. Evidence is shown in tragic occurrence even as we speakfollowing flooding incidents nationwide, as thousands of domestic animals have been reported dead while hectares of farmlands were submerged.
Truth must be told, if no action is in sight, the average global temperature will likely continue to increase unabated; and a further increase will be detrimental to human lives and our precious planet earth.
Towards limiting the average global temperature to less than 2 degree Celsius, the elders forwarded an epistle to World leaders, their epistle explicitly stated that: “If action is not taken immediately to stop and reverse current climate trends, we shall face a world with average global temperatures several degrees higher than when we were children”.
In achieving this, it is essential for all nations to draw concise feasible master plans aimed at phasing out fossil fuels towards reaching carbon neutrality target by 2050. Prior to that, assessing progressions of climate change adaptation of Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) every five years will keep consenting nations on their toes in finally reaching the milestone of carbon neutrality by 2050.
Odewale Abayomi Joseph
As stipulated by United Nations (UN), September ending has been slated as deadline for pledges submissions. A recent update by Carbon Brief indicated that European Union (EU) and over 30 countries have shown seriousness towards the course. Algeria, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Benin, Kenya, Ethiopia, Morocco and Gabon are the African countries that have submitted their pledges to the UN on how they intend to reduce greenhouse gas emissions emanating from their respective countries. Frankly speaking, negative impacts of climate change in addition to low standards of living in developing countries could be catastrophic. It is therefore expedient for other African countries to be fully committed and speedily submit their pledges by following similar suits of committed African countries. As deadline approaches, till now, Nigeria’s carbon emission pledge remains veiled.
In dousing the tension, the Director, Climate Change Department, Federal Ministry of Environment, Dr. Samuel Adejuwon, stated that Nigeria envisions submission of her pledge in September. By now, the marshal plans should have been concluded and vetted. Before final submission, an inquiry cursory gaze on the concluded plans should be done. Does the drafted plan address gas flaring management? Is Co2 reduction plan to be presented feasible? How effective is Nigeria’s Total Renewable energy transition programme? Until these questions are effectively answered, Nigeria can then be trailing the path of being wholeheartedly integrated into INDCs.
Just as below performance of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) has been attributed to skewed implementation plans, it should therefore be noted that pledges submissions to UNFCCC is not important as pledges implementation. Proactive action is aggressively needed in proper implementation because; this is the major integral part of transcending the proposed UN climate conference resolutions into reality. Great commitments need to be exhibited by governments, legislatures and citizens in reaching the set goals; these will be the driven forces for plans implementation otherwise, the gathering might be a hoax.
“We believe that climate change must be viewed not only as a danger to natural systems, but also as a direct threat to human survival and well-being. We are convinced that this negotiation process must not be viewed as a traditional series of governmental trade-offs, but as an urgent international effort to safeguard human lives, homes, rights and livelihoods,” says Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, President of the Maldives.
All hands must therefore be on deck in ensuring that COP21 is a success. This is the time for world leaders and citizenries to roll up their sleeves and jointly bounce to productive actions, this is the time for stakeholders to take up their arsenals in combating climate change threatening the planet earth because, failure of the conference is tantamount to unilaterally destroying the earth while also denying future generations the rights to unaltered environment.
By Odewale Abayomi Joseph (Climate Tracker) (Abayo4luv@gmail.com). A graduate of Civil Engineering from the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria, Odewale wrote from Oyo
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The Republic of Colombia and People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria have submitted their new climate action plans to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
UNFCCC Executive Secretary, Christiana Figueres. Photo credit: eaem.co.uk
These Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) come well in advance of a new universal climate change agreement which will be reached at the UN climate conference in Paris, in December this year.
The INDC and all others submitted by countries are available on the UNFCCC website here. Including Algeria and Colombia, 59 parties to the UNFCCC have formally submitted their INDCs.
The Paris agreement will come into effect in 2020, empowering all countries to act to prevent average global temperatures rising above 2 degrees Celsius and to reap the many opportunities that arise from a necessary global transformation to clean and sustainable development.
UNFCCC Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres is encouraging countries to come forward with their INDCs as soon as they are able, underlining their commitment and support towards this successful outcome in Paris. Governments agreed to submit their INDCs in advance of Paris.
All information such as documentation on designing and preparing INDCs as well as on sources of support for INDC preparation, is available here.
Countries have agreed that there will be no back-tracking in these national climate plans, meaning that the level of ambition to reduce emissions will increase over time.
Sixty pupils from primary schools in the Niger Delta states of Bayelsa, Delta and Rivers were on Friday (September 4) awarded full secondary school scholarships under the ‘Cradle-to-Career’ (C2C) programme run by the Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Ltd (SPDC) operated Joint Venture. They are the latest beneficiaries in a scholarship scheme that has placed 360 bright children in top secondary schools since the initiative was launched in 2010.
Shell’s General Manager, External Relations, Igo Weli
“The C2C approach marks a significant improvement in our portfolio of scholarship schemes,” pointed out General Manager, External Relations, Igo Weli, while speaking at the award ceremony in Port Harcourt. “It is designed to bridge educational inequalities resulting from geographic and socio-economic differences. SPDC and its joint venture partners are proud of the achievements of the scheme, which has received local and international accolades.”
Permanent Secretary in the Rivers State Ministry of Education, Michael West, commended SPDC and its joint venture partners for the life-transforming programme and charged other private companies to emulate the example.
He said: “Any organisation that invests in educational development is to be commended. With programmes like this, I believe we can take education to a new height.”
A guardian to one of the beneficiaries, Mrs. Maureen Benstowe, testified at the award ceremony: “The C2C scholarship scheme is definitely transforming lives. I have been carrying the burden of educating my ward alone until I heard about this programme. Today, SPDC has lifted my burden and wipe away my tears.”
Shell Spokesperson, Bamidele Olugbenga Odugbesan, disclosed in a statement on Wednesday (September 9) that Shell companies in Nigeria have a long history of supporting education through scholarships and other initiatives. In 2014, he added, the SPDC joint venture and Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company (SNEPCo) invested some $14.8 million in scholarships and other education programmes.
Fifty-year-old Martha Mwalabu travels eight kilometers to have her maize grounded so she has food for her husband, six children and grandchildren.
Construction of machine foundation underway at the Power House
Mwalabu also spends most of her time fetching firewood in the prohibitive Mulanje Mountain, Southern part of Malawi, due to conservation rules.
She is occasionally being forced to source money to buy paraffin and candles so her children can study 24/7.
“I occasionally have no money for firewood to meet cooking needs or even buy paraffin and candles so my children can study. The situation is unbearable,” she says.
Mwalabu further says that, for a woman in Bondo, sewing and other activities by candlelight or kerosene lamps is the common reality after daylight hours.
World Bank’s Take on Power in Malawi
Continued use of candles and kerosene is contrary to the World Bank 2008 report, which says kerosene lamps not only offer poor light but are also known to be the cause of a host of health problems in us as women and our children.
The report further says kerosene is a highly flammable dangerous fossil fuel that emits vapors.
“If kerosene is accidentally ingested, the vapors can cause coughing, dizziness, headaches, sore throat, unconsciousness and respiratory problems,” the report says.
Christina Msungeni, a mother of five, also says women face problems each time health workers at Bondo health centre refer them to Mulanje District Hospital because either the equipment need electricity or there is no medical expert.
Msungeni states: “The nearby health centre is also affected because most of the medical equipment needs electricity.
“Even preserving guava, pineapples, and oranges for business purposes to sustain our daily life cannot work.”
The area of Bondo is rich in pineapple and banana and other perishable crops which if well preserved could boost one’s lifestyle and become self-reliant.
Many people grow fruits which should have been processed right there only if commercial farmers and communities were connected.
“We are losing a lot in terms of gaining cash from what we grow such as bananas, sugarcanes, avocado pears pineapples, tomatoes and citrus fruits,” Msungeni says.
Mwalabu and Msungeni are among thousands of people who are not yet connected to the national power grid by the Electricity Supply Corporation of Malawi (Escom) or the Rural Electrification Programme currently in its sixth phase, according to the authorities.
Lack of power in Bondo and many other villages in senior chief Mabuka translates into complete darkness at night or limited light generated by candles or kerosene lamps.
Problems that communities face vindicates that only eight percent of the country’s 13 million people are connected to the national power grid, a source of power that has become increasingly unreliable due to power blackouts.
Role of Organisations
However, such power related hiccups would be history following works meant to construct a micro-hydro power project by Mulanje Renewable Energy Agency (MuREA) as an implementing institution on behalf of Mulanje Mountain Conservation Trust (MMCT).
Most people feel this would bring a sigh of relief because the project is likely to generate 88 megawatts for use by 400 families in the area where communities did not even dream of being connected to the national grid any time sooner.
The project will generate 75 kilowatts of power using Lichenya River whose source is Mulanje Mountain.
MuREA said recently in a project document that the amount caters for salaries and buying of power generation equipment and construction.
Almost 400 households and business enterprises are to be connected in the first phase. Community assets such as Kabichi Primary, Malowa CDSS and Bondo Health Centre should have power during the first phase,” officials interviewed at random said.
Project Challenges
While some canals were completed by last year including the power house of electricity, a visit to the area showed that they have been washed away.
The Malawi Government on the other hand is yet to issue a licence for operations of the project.
This is despite that the MurEA officials and communities are working together with the Department of Forestry in Mulanje to provide poles as metal poles were costly.
Poor Friendly Project Once Completed
The steering committee says that those with no cash, but have agricultural produce, will do the barter system to ensure more communities are connected.
At the same time the project shall encourage households to use stoves that consume less firewood and charcoal.
Initially, research has shown that there is a small provision of money for business centres to buy electrical appliances such as refrigerators and entertainment sets for their business to improve.
Although, not all will benefit from the small provision of money, some of them are well to do due to the growth of bananas, tea and other agricultural products.
Two years ago, MuREA Project officer, Horace Lumbe was quoted by The Nation saying the power project seeks to restrain people from cutting down trees in the tourist destination district in the name of searching for firewood.
People will have to use electricity in their homes, business premises and public facilities such as schools and health centres. Previously, tree conservation in Mulanje mountain was a problem hence the idea by MMCT to have the project,” Lumbe said at that time.
“We are busy with excavation of pits in all the seven villages where poles will be erected. So far poles have been treated so as to increase their lifespan,” he stated.
Once construction ends, communities and public officials would be asked to contract recognised electrical companies to wire their houses, offices and business premises before any connection.
Project Reference in Sadc
The micro-hydro power project is one of the 16 schemes that will be implemented in Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe.
Malawi will have another scheme once the pilot phase of connecting 400 families in senior chief Mabuka is finished.
The construction committee team in 2012 visited Zimbabwe just to exchange ideas on the project.
The micro-hydro power project is just in line with the continued Presidential directive for generation of electricity in rural areas to counter issues of climate change, land and environmental degradation.
Most communities in the area have spoken in praise of the micro-hydro power project, saying besides improved business opportunities, women will not have difficulties when attending to maternal services at a Bondo Health Centre in the area.
Nearly 95% of the country’s electricity supply is provided by hydropower from a cascading group of interconnected hydroelectric power plants located on the middle part of the Shire River, which flows through the Mwabvi Wildlife reserve in the south, and a mini-hydro in the northern region on the Wovwe River.
By George Mhango (Blantyre, Malawi) – WaterSan Perspective/Water Journalists – Africa
This story was produced with support from the CSE Media Fellowships Programme for the Global South.
On the Dead Sea’s coast in the occupied West Bank, Israeli settlers, Palestinians and tourists make the downhill trek from the former waterline to its new resting place.
Israel, Jordan, and the occupied West Bank all border the Dead Sea and have taken steps to deal with its disappearance. Photo credit: Getty Images
The Dead Sea, a unique body of water marked by mineral-rich, unusually salty water – nearly 10 times saltier than the world’s oceans – is dying. Its water level is dropping by roughly one metre each year.
“We think that the current situation is an ecological disaster,” said Gidon Bromberg, director of EcoPeace Middle East(EPME), an organisation that brings together Israeli, Jordanian and Palestinian environmentalists to protect their shared environmental heritage.
“It’s unacceptable: The unique ecosystem is in severe danger, threatening biodiversity, and you see dramatic sinkholes opening up along the shore,” Bromberg said, referring to the large, unpredictable cavities that have appeared recently. Some are so cavernous that they swallow entire structures.
Gidon Bromberg, director of EcoPeace Middle East (EPME). Photo credit: skollworldforum.org
According to Bromberg, the two main reasons for the dropping water level are mineral extraction by Israeli and Jordanian companies in the artificially shallow southern basin, and the fact that 95 percent of the Jordan River – the Dead Sea’s main source of replenishing water – is being diverted. The river used to provide 1,350 million cubic metres (mcm) of water each year, but that flow has dwindled to just 20 mcm.
Israel, Jordan, and the occupied West Bank all border the Dead Sea, and have taken steps to deal with its disappearance. The first concrete plan was signed in 2005, whenall three parties signed a letterto the World Bank that allowed the international financial institution to investigate the feasibility of a $10 billion project to pump 850 mcm of water from Jordan’s section of the Red Sea to a desalination plant at the southern end of the Dead Sea.
The 2,000 mcm of ultra-saline brine that results from the desalination process would then be pumped to the Dead Sea over the course of 40 years. Bromberg said EPME was unable to support this project, because the “environmental impact was unknowable”.
A main concern for environmental groups has been the effect that introducing such high volumes of foreign brine water would have on the Dead Sea’s unique ecosystem, whichfeatures unique bacterial and fungal life forms.
After years of consultations involving government officials and civil society groups, including EPME, the original project was put on hold. However, the parties continued negotiations, and in February, a final agreement emerged: a $950m “pilot programme” water-sharing arrangement, in which Jordan will construct a desalination plant near Aqaba, on the coast of the Red Sea.
The scheme will produce about 85 mcm of fresh water a year. Up to 50 mcm will be sold to the southern Israeli resort city of Eilat, leaving about 35 mcm for use in Aqaba city. As part of the agreement, Israel will sell another 50 mcm of freshwater to Amman from the Sea of Galilee.
EPME supports the new water change agreement between Israel and Jordan. Bromberg told Al Jazeera that this much smaller project “will have manageable environmental impacts that make a lot more sense”. However, EPME does not support the deal’s proposed pipeline that will pump desalinated water to the Dead Sea from Aqaba, saying the projected cost of $400m is “not realistic” and would only halt the drop in the Dead Sea’s water level by about 10 percent, without addressing related environmental concerns.
Jordan, as one of the world’s mostwater-scarce countries, stands to gain from the agreement. But the Palestinian Authority (PA), the governing body of the occupied West Bank, was left out. Israel and Jordan are approaching the new arrangement bilaterally.
The PA is awaiting negotiations with Israel on a separate agreement, in which Israel would sell another 20-30 mcm a year to the West Bank.
Clemens Messerschmid, a German hydrogeologist who has been working on water projects in the Gaza Strip and West Bank since 1997, told Al Jazeera that these agreements were nothing more than an attempt by Israel to cement the current status quo, in which it controls water extraction from the occupied territories and the Jordan River basin then sells this water back to Palestinians.
“Palestinians, by default, are the real loser of these agreements, whether the ‘pilot programmes’ or the $10 billion World Bank scheme,” Messerschmid said.
Israel became a water-surplus country in 2013. Often,programmes encouraging conservation and recycling of waste waterare cited as the reason for Israel’s water surplus, but Messerschmid said the overwhelming majority of the surplus comes from the five desalination plants constructed along Israel’s Mediterranean coast.
The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics says thatroughly 100 mcmof water are extracted for use in the occupied territories from their own resources, namely aquifers in the West Bank, every year. The West Bank’s yearly water need is 400-450 mcm, leaving a gap that must be filled by purchasing water from Israel.
“Under international law, Palestinians in the West Bank have the right to access the water of the Jordan River, but they haven’t seen a drop since 1967,” Messerschmid stated. “Furthermore, Israel doesn’t allow them access to more than microscopic amounts from the local mountain aquifer sources.”
TheEastern Mountain Aquifersits almost entirely within the West Bank, and has no inflows or outflows to or from Israel. However, according to Ayman Rabi, director of thePalestinian Hydrology Group (PHG), this aquifer has been pumped nearly dry by Israeli settlers living in the West Bank, and has “no more potential” for water extraction.
“I would say that the situation in the West Bank is worse than ever before, with water access and availability at dire levels,” Rabi told Al Jazeera.
Both Rabi and Bromberg were hopeful about one aspect of the new water reality in the region: Israel’s water surplus should make negotiations on Palestinian water rights easier.
“Five years ago, had you wanted to share the water more fairly, Israeli farmers would have blocked every road. With this surplus, natural water can be shared more fairly,” Bromberg said.
As for the Dead Sea, Bromberg predicted that it will “never completely dry up”. Surrounding springs will continue to replenish some of the water, but the current water level of 417 metres below sea level could fall to more than 700 metres below sea level in the coming years. The reduced water level could even more seriously endanger biodiversity.
Messerschmid, meanwhile, believes that the uproar over the Dead Sea’s water needs pales in comparison to the water needs of the Palestinians. “These are real people, with real concerns regarding access to water; 4.6 million Palestinians [have been] held hostage to Israel’s hydro-apartheid for half a century,” he said.
“Their rights should be held above that of the bacteria at the bottom of the Dead Sea.”
The world’s demand for water is likely to surge in the next few decades. Rapidly growing populations will drive increased consumption by people, farms and companies. More people will move to cities, further straining supplies. An emerging middle class could clamor for more water-intensive food production and electricity generation.
Dubai, UAE: 14 of the 33 countries most likely to be water-stressed in 2040 are in the Middle East. Photo credit: Jason Mrachina/Flickr
But it’s not clear where all that water will come from. Climate change is expected to make some areas drier and others wetter. As precipitation extremes increase in some regions, affected communities face greater threats from droughts and floods.
While changing water supply and demand is inevitable, exactly what that change will look like around the world is far from certain. A first-of-its-kind analysis by the World Resources Institute (WRI) sheds new light on the issue.
Using an ensemble of climate models and socioeconomic scenarios, WRI scored and ranked future water stress – a measure of competition and depletion of surface water – in 167 countries by 2020, 2030, and 2040. We found that 33 countries face extremely high water stress in 2040 (see the full list). We also found that Chile, Estonia, Namibia, and Botswana could face an especially significant increase in water stress by 2040. This means that businesses, farms, and communities in these countries in particular may be more vulnerable to scarcity than they are today.
Challenging Future for a Volatile Region
Fourteen of the 33 likely most water-stressed countries in 2040 are in the Middle East, including nine considered extremely highly stressed with a score of 5.0 out of 5.0: Bahrain, Kuwait, Palestine, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Oman and Lebanon. The region, already arguably the least water-secure in the world, draws heavily upon groundwater and desalinated sea water, and faces exceptional water-related challenges for the foreseeable future.
With regional violence and political turmoil commanding global attention, water may seem tangential. However, drought and water shortages in Syria likely contributed to the unrest that stoked the country’s 2011 civil war. Dwindling water resources and chronic mismanagement forced 1.5 million people, primarily farmers and herders, to lose their livelihoods and leave their land, move to urban areas, and magnify Syria’s general destabilisation.
The problem extends to other countries. Water is a significant dimension of the decades-old conflict between Palestine and Israel. Saudi Arabia’s government said its people will depend entirely on grain imports by 2016, a change from decades of growing all they need, due to fear of water-resource depletion. The U.S. National Intelligence Council wrote that water problems will put key North African and Middle Eastern countries at greater risk of instability and state failure and distract them from foreign policy engagements with the U.S.
Water Stress for the World’s Largest Economies
While they will probably not face the extreme water stress blanketing the Middle East in 2040, global superpowers such as the United States, China and India face water risks of their own. High water stress in all three countries are projected to remain roughly constant through 2040. However, specific areas of each, such as the southwestern U.S. and China’s Ningxia province, could see water stress increase by up to 40 to 70 percent.
This pattern reflects a limitation of national-level datasets. Averaging future water stress across an entire country into a single score can disguise local-level risks, even using WRI’s weighting algorithm to count water stress where water is used the most. WRI generally recommends that most Aqueduct users operate at the tool’s standard sub-river basin level with more granular information. However, certain users, such as international commercial banks with national portfolios, depend on national indicators to assess risk, so rankings and aggregated scores are valuable.
Uncertainty permeates these forward-looking models because future climate conditions and development patterns are impossible to predict. Instead of focusing on a best or more likely scenario for future climate conditions, these rankings illustrate one possible future of water supply and demand.
We chose this future in consultation with leading experts because it is simplified yet useful information to help international, organisations, businesses, and financial institutions take steps to mitigate risks. This set of rankings and scores can also help users more effectively adapt to a plausible future climate change and water demand scenario.
What’s Driving the Change?
Every water-stressed country is affected by a different combination of factors. Chile, for example, projected to move from medium water stress in 2010 to extremely high stress in 2040, is among the countries more likely to face a water supply decrease from the combined effects of rising temperatures in critical regions and shifting precipitation patterns.
Botswana and Namibia sit squarely within a region that is already vulnerable to climate change. Water supplies are limited, and risk from floods and droughts is high. Projected temperature increases in southern Africa are likely to exceed the global average, along with overall drying and increased rainfall variability. On the water demand side, according to Aqueduct projections, a 40 to 70 percent – or greater – increase is expected, further exacerbating the region’s concerns.
Whatever the drivers, extremely high water stress creates an environment in which companies, farms and residents are highly dependent on limited amounts of water and vulnerable to the slightest change in supply. Such situations severely threaten national water security and economic growth. National and local governments must bring forward strong national climate action plans and support a strong international climate agreement in Paris this November. Governments must also respond with management and conservation practices that will help protect essential sustainable water resources for years to come.
