FEATURE ARTICLE

Does the world face a looming water crisis? Yes. A new global assessment of regional freshwater resources confirms that a quarter of the world population still has no safe water supply and a half lacks adequate sanitation. As a consequence people are still dying from lack of adequate water services and water-related diseases. Global water quality is still declining and organic micro-pollutants continue to degrade ecosystems and habitats. Furthermore, water quality data are still unavailable in many parts of the world and inadequate in others, while in certain regions networks continue to degrade.

There are various crises. Certain parts of the world are experiencing growing scarcity, worsening pollution and over-consumption, exacerbated by drought and floods; for example in the Sahel and Lake Chad. Locally and regionally, water resources are often exceeded by the demand for water. Demands for water services are growing, and frequently along transboundary and international rivers. Population growth environmental change such as watershed degradation, including climate change, can make the prospects for continuing economic and social development look bleak. With increasing demands, managers face growing uncertainty and the prospect that their decisions will fail to provide water of adequate quantity and quality, and protect against floods, pollution events and water-related diseases.

But trends are not destiny. A variety of human actions can mitigate this water crisis, change trends leading to greater crises and create opportunities for improving the quality of life, maintaining ecosystems and generating wealth and sustainable development.

A number of global gatherings have addressed water as a major issue, from the 1977 UN Water Conference in Mar del Plata, Argentina, to the U N Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 and the recent UN Commission for Sustainable Development negotiations on fresh water. Many recommendations from these meetings have become the practice of certain international and national programmes. But much remains to be done, especially to raise the salience of water issues to political decision-makers. This conference and its recommended actions are directed to the water community and policy makers.

Action needed

First, humanity must decide to take action. Indeed, the water community is obligated to proactively seek such opportunities. Second, human actions must be taken within the framework of new partnerships among the full spectrum of users of water services, those who pay and those who benefit, political and technical professionals, ecosystems and engineering, citizens and private and public decision-makers, and science and humanity. Third, action must be participatory, transparent, creative and technically sound. Fourth, improved cost effectiveness and increasing confidence, new technology, new concepts and new ideas leading to increasing flexibility of water resources systems and the institutions that manage them are needed. Five, improved assessment and management of risk, increased reliability of traditional, technical and new demand orientated data, improved awareness of water and enhanced public participation are needed.

Better information on the quantity and quality of surface and ground water, on related areas, such as on the flora and fauna in water bodies is required. Integrated approaches to database and information management should be adopted. They should include data on natural and artificial flows. They should stress the importance of the length of record and the range of variables so those trends may be identified. The variability of water resources in space and time, and not simply average conditions, should be available. Water related information systems should be integrated with other aspects of water management systems, especially on demand and use, and with information on comprehensive environmental management. Time and space scales of hydrological processes especially for ground water are important.

While, participants acknowledged a basic human right to some minimum water need, quantifying that need is difficult. Water and sanitation budgets should be dramatically increased and come closer to commitments for defence and security.

The effects of human activities on water resources and the environment, in general, have to be separated from those resulting from the natural variability of climate. This is particularly important where water resources are already under great stress, such as in arid and semi-arid areas. Stakeholder participation is vital to sustainable water resources management, backed by the development and implementation of new water laws. Effective policies to protect water resources, particularly groundwater resources, have to be launched.

Policy analysis using computer simulations and measures for analysing current trends were seen as useful tools for addressing future water issues, but an integrated approach to planning for future water requirements is necessary. Such integrated approaches must consider the full spectrum of options, from structural (such as dams and channelisation) to non-structural (such as conservation, pricing and bio-engineering).

A better understanding of the history of water management and its lessons is needed. Technical and non-technical people involved with water need to better communicate and educate each other. We need more and better training for younger generations. Continuing and increasing education coupled with technology transfer is needed. For example, lessons learned from floods in certain countries could provide assistance to others such as: infiltration facilities, flood proofing techniques and quantitative precipitation forecasting. Protection by dikes is necessary on large rivers while effective warning and evacuation systems are vital in order to reduce the toll of deaths.

Improved and integrated water management requires a better sense of the costs and value of water. Water pricing in agriculture, the dominant use of water world wide, highlights this need. Water is a social as well as an economic good. Participants debated the meaning of "value", "price", and economic good. Some suggested using services rather than economic good. Others suggested using opportunity costs. Participants agreed that water services should not be free of charge but paid for at a socially affordable level. However, that level will differ among cultures and circumstances.

A variety of institutional and legal systems exist which allow nations to make their own approaches to water resources management. They include public and private options, usership as opposed to ownership and demand management against needs based planning. Integrated water resources management has to take into account economic, social, cultural and environmental aspects along with principles such as "the polluter pays". While water markets function in some areas the viability of market mechanisms requires study. Participants called for a major world forum to debate the theoretical and practical issues behind the notion of water as an economic good.

While water offers potential for conflict, it provides a powerful tool for co-operation. Water has often been the vehicle for parties in adverse relationships to talk. It has been and should be seen as a major opportunity for second track diplomacy and peace building.

These actions are directed to ongoing global efforts such as: the International Hydrological Programme (IHP) of UNESCO, the 1999 World Science Conference, the Water Vision of the World Water Council, the Second Global Freshwater Assessment and the Encyclopaedia of Life Support Systems.