Source material and useful links for Water Scarcity briefings

29/7/2021: A recent scientific paper suggests that population growth alone (not factoring in climate change or water quality considerations) will lead to a widespread drop in freshwater availability per capita. Low-income countries are projected to have an average drop in water availability of around 46% by 2050.

Source: Inter Press Service

Billions risk being without access to clean water by 2030

1/7/2021: Latest global data from the World Health Organization and UN Children’s Fund reveals that access to safely managed drinking water at home increased only from 70 to 74 per cent between 2016 and 2020. Achieving the Sustainable Development Goal of universal coverage by 2030 will require a quadrupling of the current rate of progress.

Source: UN News

Big irrigation projects in Africa have failed to deliver

9/6/2021: Failures of large-scale irrigation in sub-Saharan Africa over several decades may be due to a preference for large projects. Entrepreneurial small-scale farmers may offer better returns on investment in food and water security as rainfall patterns become increasingly erratic.

Source: The Conversation

The war waged against access to clean water and sanitation

9/6/2021: A new report by UNICEF highlights that attacks on clean water infrastructure in conflict regions are increasing. Attacks that aim to terrorize a population, or as a military advantage, contravene international humanitarian law.

Source: Devex

China makes desalination push to ease water scarcity

3/6/2021: China will invest in new desalination plants over the 2021 to 2025 period in a bid to backup municipal water supplies in regions suffering from shortages. China's water per capita is about 2,000 cubic metres, less than a quarter of the global average and among the lowest in the world.

Source: CNA

Wards without water

25/5/2021: More than half of healthcare facilities in Malawi are without handwashing facilities, almost two thirds have no decent toilets and almost one fifth do not have clean water on site. Staff are fighting Covid-19 without a first line of defence against infection. The World Health Organization estimates that to bring clean water and sanitation facilities to healthcare centres in the poorest countries would cost $3.6 billion, a fraction of a single European country's investment in Covid vaccines.

Source: Inter Press Service

India's deepening water crisis at the heart of farm protests

30/4/2021: Recent decades of central government subsidy of rice crops has devastated groundwater resources in the Punjab, now projected to run dry by 2039. Current attempts to reform the subsidy regime fail to take account of the plight of small farmers.

Source: CNA

Scientists warn of looming groundwater crisis

29/4/2021: Nearly half of the human population depends on grounwater for daily needs and for agriculture. But up to a fifth of wells worldwide that tap into these reserves are at risk of running dry, according to a recent study.

Source: Mongabay

How Yemen's solar power revolution drains groundwater

28/4/2021: Yemenis have turned to solar power to restore normal lives. But research suggests that too much water is being pumped for agriculture, an example of the sensitivity of the water-energy-food nexus.

Source: DW

How leadership makes a difference on water and sanitation

14/4/2021: There is no evidence that formal international commitments to deliver access to clean water and safe sanitation achieve results. It is effective national and municipal leadership that makes the real difference, therefore more deserving of funding support than construction projects.

Source: From Poverty to Power

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