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The World Resources Institute (WRI) has just released a report stating that approximately half of the world's population faces high water stress for at least one month a year. The water shortage is projected to worsen.
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The World Resources Institute (WRI), which specializes in research on resource and environmental issues, has collaborated with Aqueduct – a program supported by a coalition of research centers, universities, governments , and businesses – to publish a map showing current and future water scarcity. According to WRI and Aqueduct's analysis, based on data from 1979 to 2019, the proportion of the population affected could increase to nearly 60% by 2050.
"High stress" means that at least 60% of available water resources have been used, leading to local competition among different users. Currently, 25 countries are facing "extremely high" water stress, meaning the imbalance between their water use and reserves has reached at least 80%. Some countries, such as Bahrain, Cyprus, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, and Chile, are facing the most severe situations. It is projected that an additional 1 billion people will live under extremely high water stress by the middle of this century. Samantha Kuzma, a data management and geolocation expert for the Aqueduct and WRI programs, warns: "Our analysis only shows long-term trends and provides average figures. It doesn't account for potential peaks that could have worse and more localized consequences."
WRI's water allocation forecast map also highlights the risks to food security. Accordingly, 60% of irrigated crops are threatened due to extremely high water stress.
According to WRI, approximately 31% of the world's GDP could suffer the consequences of high, even very high, water stress by 2050, compared to 24% in 2010.
Globally, water demand has been steadily increasing (doubling since 1960) due to the boom in irrigated agriculture , the growing demand for energy production, industries, and population growth.
In fact, the rate of increase in water demand is even faster than the rate of global population growth, especially in developing countries.
According to researchers, the natural water cycle is changing, causing heavy rainfall and extremely severe droughts. As a resource, water is becoming increasingly scarce as humans and most living organisms in nature need it more than ever, especially during more intense heatwaves.
Therefore, WRI asserts that the world is facing an unprecedented water crisis, exacerbated by climate change. The report's authors argue that mitigating the impact of the water crisis will not be costly, provided that water management is improved. They estimate that the necessary budget would be around 1% of global GDP to address the lack of regular investment in infrastructure, change irrigation patterns, and focus on developing nature-based solutions…
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