What Is Water? - Worldwide Water Crisis

Despite conservation and reclamation efforts, the world still faces a severe scarcity of sanitary water. According to a January 26, 2003, article in USA Today (Dan Vergano, "Water Shortages Could Leave World in Dire Straits"), the United Nations (UN) has predicted that within fifty years, more than half of the world's population will be living with water shortages, depleted fisheries, and polluted coastlines. The UN study, World Water Development—based on data provided by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the World Health Organization, and other organizations—found that the severe water shortages faced by at least 400 million people today will affect four billion people by 2050. The study also concluded that waste and inadequate management of water, especially in poverty-stricken areas, were the main causes of the problems.

The scarcity of clean water throughout the world also has significant implications for public health. A UN World Water Development study found that water contaminated with bacteria, parasites, and other microbes causes about 6,000 deaths every day, including 1.4 million children under the age of five.

Water shortages also affect international politics. The UN estimates that more than 260 of the world's river basins are shared by at least two countries. Conflicts arise when one country tries to dam up, siphon off, or pollute the shared water. According to the UN, since 1820 there have been more than 400 agreements related to water as a limited and consumable resource. Meredith A. Giordano and Aaron T. Wolf noted in Atlas of International Freshwater Agreements (United Nations Environment Programme, 2002) that while cooperation about water resources between and among countries during the past fifty years has outnumbered conflicts by more than two-to-one, problems still can occur. Giordano and Wolf also stated that between 1948 and 2002 only thirty-seven incidents of violent conflict occurred over water, thirty of which were between Israel and one or another of its neighbors. However, the Pacific Institute identified several more instances in 2003 and 2004, including disputes in Colombia, India, Iraq, Mexico, Pakistan, Somalia, and Sudan ("Water Conflict Chronology," http://www.worldwater.org/conflict.htm, December 2004).