Water Scarcity is a Real Threat
WATER SCARCITY
The next war ripping across continents may well be triggered by water scarcity. Already a
third of the world is suffering from water shortages. Ironically, rainfall has been adequate.
The water is there. But what has gone awry is its management. Water scarcity in Asia and
Australia alone affects a fourth of the world’s population and is triggered by over-usage
whereas in Africa, it is lack of adequate infrastructure that wreaks havoc.
Water scarcity around the world has come about primarily due to quintessentially wasteful
practices that have seeped into present-day agriculture which sadly mops up 80% of fresh
water. Over the past 100 years, water usage has gone up by six times globally, and is
threatening to double again by the year 2050, driven mainly by demands of irrigation and
increased agricultural activities. Current methods of irrigation will have to be urgently
revisited and more efficient means reinvented. Problems of water scarcity can best be
addressed by better efficiency in its utilisation, recycling, pricing of water (and the electricity
used for lifting and conveying the water) where not already in vogue, transportation without
losses, leaks and pilferage, and through education of the perils of the dangers to all humanity
that is presently straining at the tethers due to the current reckless abandon with which it has
been mismanaged.
Interestingly rich nations like Australia are not immune to water scarcity. An urban
Australian on the average trashes 300 litres of water daily and the European notches 200
litres, while the sub-Saharan African makes do with less than 20 litres a day. On the other
side, one never ceases to marvel at Israel, which has truly mastered the art and science of
water and its sustainable utilisation, conservation and augmentation. For a country that
receives a best average rainfall of about 700 mm annually (in the Zefat region in the northern
The next war ripping across continents may well be triggered by water scarcity. Already a
third of the world is suffering from water shortages. Ironically, rainfall has been adequate.
The water is there. But what has gone awry is its management. Water scarcity in Asia and
Australia alone affects a fourth of the world’s population and is triggered by over-usage
whereas in Africa, it is lack of adequate infrastructure that wreaks havoc.
Water scarcity around the world has come about primarily due to quintessentially wasteful
practices that have seeped into present-day agriculture which sadly mops up 80% of fresh
water. Over the past 100 years, water usage has gone up by six times globally, and is
threatening to double again by the year 2050, driven mainly by demands of irrigation and
increased agricultural activities. Current methods of irrigation will have to be urgently
revisited and more efficient means reinvented. Problems of water scarcity can best be
addressed by better efficiency in its utilisation, recycling, pricing of water (and the electricity
used for lifting and conveying the water) where not already in vogue, transportation without
losses, leaks and pilferage, and through education of the perils of the dangers to all humanity
that is presently straining at the tethers due to the current reckless abandon with which it has
been mismanaged.
Interestingly rich nations like Australia are not immune to water scarcity. An urban
Australian on the average trashes 300 litres of water daily and the European notches 200
litres, while the sub-Saharan African makes do with less than 20 litres a day. On the other
side, one never ceases to marvel at Israel, which has truly mastered the art and science of
water and its sustainable utilisation, conservation and augmentation. For a country that
receives a best average rainfall of about 700 mm annually (in the Zefat region in the northern