UN World Water Development Report 2018 (Part 2)

The Key Messages of the UN World Water Development Report 2018 were:

·      Ecological processes driven by vegetation and soils in forests, grasslands, wetlands, as well as in agricultural and urban landscapes, play a major role in the movement, storage and transformation of water.

·      Nature-based solutions (NBS) use or mimic natural processes to enhance water availability (e.g., soil moisture retention, groundwater recharge), improve water quality (e.g., natural and constructed wetlands,

·      riparian buffer strips), and reduce risks associated with water-related disasters and climate change (e.g., floodplain restoration, green roofs).

·      NBS offer significant potential to address contemporary water management challenges across all sectors, and particularly regarding sustainable agriculture and sustainable cities.

·      NBS contribute to reversing trends in ecosystem degradation, a major cause of water problems worldwide.

·      NBS are essential to achieving the water-related Goals and Targets of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and directly contribute to meeting several other interdependent Goals and Targets.

·      NBS generate social, economic and environmental co-benefits, including human health and livelihoods, food and energy security, sustainable economic growth, decent jobs, ecosystem rehabilitation and

·      maintenance, and biodiversity.

·      NBS include green infrastructure that can substitute, augment or work in parallel with human-built (‘grey’) infrastructure in a cost-effective manner, providing alternative options for coping with insufficient or ageing water infrastructure while improving system-wide resilience and performance.

·      NBS, like grey infrastructure, have limits: NBS are not a panacea and must be evaluated and deployed based on locality specific conditions.

·      Water management remains heavily dominated by grey infrastructure, such that the considerable potential for NBS is largely under-utilized.

·      The objective is to find the most appropriate balance between green and grey infrastructure that maximizes benefits and system efficiency while minimizing costs and trade-offs.

·      There are emerging innovative options for financing NBS, such as payment for ecosystem services schemes and green bonds.

·      The substantial value of the co-benefits from NBS can tip investment decisions in their favour.

·      Sustainable water security will not be achieved through business-as-usual, and NBS provide an essential means of moving beyond conventional approaches.

India-related story in WWDR 2018

NBS Benefits at Scale – Landscape Restoration to Improve Water Security in Rajasthan, India Unusually low rainfall in 1985–86, combined with excessive logging, led to the worst droughts in the history of Rajasthan. The district of Alwar, one of the poorest in the State, was severely affected. The groundwater table had receded below critical levels and the State declared parts of the area ‘dark zones’, which meant the severity of the situation warranted restrictions on any further groundwater extractions. Tarun Bharat Sangh, a local NGO, supported the local communities to undertake landscape-scale restoration of local water cycles and water resources. With leadership provided by women, who customarily take responsibility for providing their families with safe freshwater, traditional local initiatives for water were revived by bringing people together on the issues of management of forests and water resources. Activities centred on the construction of small-scale water harvesting structures combined with the regeneration of forests and soils, particularly in upper catchments, to help improve the recharge of groundwater resources. The impact has been significant. For example: Water was brought back to 1000 villages across the State. Five rivers that used to run dry after the annual monsoon season are now flowing again and fisheries in them re-established. Groundwater levels have risen by an estimated six metres. Productive farmland increased from 20% to 80% of the catchment. Crucial forest cover, including in farmlands, which helps to maintain the integrity and water-retaining capacity of the soil, has increased by 33%. The return of wildlife such as antelope and leopard has been observed.

UN World Water Development Report 2018 (Part 1)

The UN World Water Development Report 2018 focused on the theme:

Nature-Based Solutions for Water - Working with nature to improve the management of water resources, achieve water security for all, and contribute to core aspects of sustainable development

Main Facts and Figures from WWDR 2018

Water Demand

·      Contemporary global water demand has been estimated at about 4,600 km3 per year and projected to increase by 20–30% to between 5,500 and 6,000 cu km per year by 2050.

·      Water use increases at the global level, as a function of population growth, economic development and changing consumption patterns, among other factors.

·      Over the period 2017–2050, the world population is expected to increase from 7.7 billion to between 9.4
and 10.2 billion, with two thirds of the population living in cities. More than half of this anticipated growth is expected to occur in Africa (+1.3 billion), with Asia (+0.75 billion) expected to be the second largest contributor to future population growth.

·      Global water use has increased by a factor of six over the past 100 years and continues to grow steadily at a rate of about 1% per year.

·      Domestic water use, which roughly accounts for 10% of global water withdrawals, is expected to increase significantly over the 2010–2050 period in nearly all regions of the world.  

·      Groundwater use globally, mainly for agriculture, amounts to 800 cu km per year in the 2010s, with India, the US, China, Iran and Pakistan (in descending order) accounting for 67% of total abstractions worldwide.

·      Global demands for agricultural and energy production (mainly food and electricity), both of which are water-intensive, are expected to increase by roughly 60% and 80%, respectively by 2025.

·      Meeting the estimated 60% increase in food demand will require the expansion of arable land under business-as-usual. Under prevailing management practices, intensification of production involves increased mechanical disturbance of soil and inputs
of agrochemicals, energy and water. These drivers associated with food systems account for 70% of
the predicted loss of terrestrial biodiversity by 2050. However, these impacts, including requirements for more land and water, can largely be avoided if further intensification of production
is based on ecological intensification that involves improving ecosystem services to reduce external inputs.

Growing Water Scarcity

·      Many countries are already undergoing pervasive water scarcity conditions and will likely have to cope with lower surface water resources availability in the 2050s.

·      Throughout the early-mid 2010s, about 1.9 billion people (27% of the global population) lived in potential severely water-scarce areas. If monthly variability is taken into account, 3.6 billion people worldwide (nearly half the global population) are already living in potential water- scarce areas at least one month per year and this could increase to some 4.8–5.7 billion in 2050. About 73% of the affected people live in Asia (69% by 2050).

·      Water withdrawals for irrigation have been identified as the primary driver of groundwater depletion worldwide. For the 2050s, a large surge in groundwater abstractions amounting to 1,100 cu km per year has been predicted, corresponding to a 39% increase over current levels.

·      A third of the world’s biggest groundwater systems
are already in distress. The above-mentioned groundwater trends also assume increasing withdrawals from non-renewable (fossil) groundwater – indisputably an unsustainable path.

·      The importance of current water availability challenges can only be fully understood by comparing water withdrawal to their maximum sustainable levels. At about 4,600 cu km per year, current global withdrawals are already near maximum sustainable levels and, as noted in previous World Water Development Reports, global figures mask more severe challenges at regional and local scales.

Water Quality

·      Since the 1990s, water pollution has worsened in almost all rivers in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The deterioration of water quality is expected to escalate over the next decades and this will increase threats to human health, the environment and sustainable development.

·      An estimated 80% of all industrial and municipal wastewater is released to the environment without any prior treatment, resulting in a growing deterioration of overall water quality with detrimental impacts on human health and ecosystems.