World Water Vision Ved Hans Jørgen Henriksen Vand er en af de mest værdifulde  substanser på jorden, selvom ressourcen ikke altid behandles  sådan. Vi ved at fremtiden ikke vil se ud ligesom fortiden,  med ændringer i en voksende befolkning, urbanisering, vækst  i indkomster, og det hermed forbundne behov for mere mad og vand,  som vil medføre en voksende belastning for vores begrænsede  vandforsyning. Behovet for handling er kritisk. World  Water Vision projektet sponsoreres af World Water Council, Verdensbanken  og alle de vigtigste FN organisationer som er involveret i vand  inclusiv FAO, UNDP, UNEP, UNESCO, UNU, WMO, WHO, UNICEF og er  ledet af "World Commision on Water for the 21st Century",  en tænketank som har Ismail Serageldin, vicepræsident  for Verdensbanken som formand. Mere information på http://watervision.org   Nilen ved Aswan (Kilde: Len Abrams/The  African Water Page: http://www.africanwater.org/index.htm)   Solution for a thirsty world? Ismail Serageldin (fra Messages  to initiate consultations for the World Water Vision, 2nd draft,  18. marts 1999) Everyday, 230,000 people join the  human race. Each and every one of them will depend on water to  live. But fresh water is becoming increasingly difficult to access  and dirtier. The competition for water is becoming more intense,  and millions of people may go hungry as individuals, industry  and farmers compete for limited resources. But it doesn't have to be this way. Our children and the health  of the planet itself will depend on our willingness to make a  set of choices about managing this most precious resource that  are different than the ones we are making today, and to make  them soon. Ninety-seven-and-a-half percent of the world's water  is unusable because it is full of salt. Most of the remaining  2.5 percent is locked up in the polar ice caps or lost to evaporation.  All told, less than one tenth of one percent of all the water  on the planet is available for the use of humans, plants and  animals. Already, a good part of humanity is sick and dying because of  the shortage of clean, fresh water; 1.4 billion people don't  have safe drinking water; 2.3 billion lack adequate sanitation.  A fifth of the world's population, mostly children, suffers from  illnesses related to water; 7 million a year die from water-borne  diseases. Natural ecosystems on which all life depends are also suffering.  Half the rivers and lakes in Europe and North America are seriously  polluted. And the draining of large bodies of water like the  Aral Sea and Florida Everglades has caused massive environmental  damage, economic disaster or both. Already, California has lost  90 percent of its wetlands. If this appears bad, we know that with present trends things  are likely to get much worse before they get better. Right now,  31 countries are facing water shortages. In 25 years, as the  world's population grows by another 3 billion people, that number  will increase to 48 countries, and by 2050, 55 countries will  be in serious trouble. All but a few of those countries are found  in the developing world, in precisely the same regions where  population growth will be most pronounced. But the problems will  not be limited to poor countries. Parts of southern Europe and  the western United States will face severe water shortages. Many experts believe that the shortages of fresh water is looming  as the most serious obstacle to global food security. Food production  consumes over 70 % of all water used by humans. Even if we increase  the efficiency by which agriculture uses water from the current  45 percent to 70 percent, the world will still need a fifth more  water to feed the growing number of mouths and meet its other  development needs. One of the consequences of failing to better  manage water resources may be higher food prices and expensive  food imports to poor, water scarce countries. Already, 800 million  people are going hungry because they cannot afford to buy food. This crisis will not only affect food production. Water availability  in urban areas will also be seriously threatened. Some of the  world's largest cities, including Beijing, Buenos Aires, Dhaka,  Lima and Mexico City, depend heavily on groundwater for their  water supply. But dependence on aquifers, which take many years  to fill, may not be sustainable. As a whole, India is using twice  as much water from its aquifers as is being replenished naturally.  Most countries in North Africa and the Middle East are mining  their aquifers, as do inhabitants of the Colorado basin in the  USA. Libya consumes 3.7 times its renewable water resources. This year, the international community has joined forces to seriously  address the coming crisis. The World Water Council (WWC), with  the support of all the United Nations Organizations, the World  Bank and the governments of one dozen donor countries has created  the World Commission on Water for the 21st Century. The Commission  will recommend both basic and outside-the-box solutions to our  water problems and convince policy makers to act on them. The  Global Water Partnership (GWP) is preparing a framework for Action  to implement the Commission's recommendations. All this work  is already starting and will be involving thousands of professionals  and stakeholders around the world in the months ahead. Special  regional consultations are planned, and special outreach programs  to involve women and youth in the design of solutions are being  organized. While my colleages and I on the Commission are alarmed  by the current forecasts, we are also optimistic that the world  can provide for its growing water needs. What can we do? One basic problem is that many of us have shown a reluctance  to treat water as an economic as well as a public good. Another  is that management of water resources and the environment in  every country is fragmented among many institutions, most with  little regard for conflicts between social, economic and environmental  objectives. In general, there is little recognition that health  and environmental problems are associated with bad water management.  That has to change. Radical and innovative plans can be devised to avert the coming  disaster. Creating more freshwater is not an obvious solution.  Taking the salt out of seawater is still an expensive process.  While it is likely to get cheaper as energy becomes less expensive,  the costs of desalinated water will still be beyond the means  of most people. We can explore other technological solutions  such as rainwater harvesting, dry toilets, water transport, reuse  of waste water, and engineering less thirsty and more drought-resistant  crops. We can integrate water management organizations, we can  think of innovative ways of partnering the private sector, local  communities and NGOs to ensure the effective and efficient use  of water for all the world's economic and social needs. But technology developments and restructuring of organizations  will not be enough. Acting to meet the challenges will require  much more. We will need nothing less than changed values and  behavior on a global scale coupled with informed and enlightened  leadership. The World Commission will present a vision of that  future, accompanied by a framework of action to implement the  vision, to world leaders and many others meeting at The Hague  in March 2000. Will we be able to seize this millennial moment  to change our ways and by wise actions today lay the foundations  for better tomorows for our children?   Death Valley, Californien Foto: H.J. Henriksen

December 1999 - © GEUS
Webredaktør: th@geus.dk