Mar 29, 2015
Topics:
• The world’s water picture and global water challenges
• Water as a source of violent conflict (pathways and probabilities)
• Water cooperation initiatives
Water is…
…unsubstitutable in its most important uses;
…unevenly distributed;
…difficult to capture;
…movable, but often only at great social, economic, or ecological cost;
…highly variable over time in its availability.
I. The world’s water challenges
• Addressing unmet human water needs
• Allocating water across competing sectoral needs: agricultural, industrial, municipal
• Managing and reversing the impact on critical freshwater ecosystems
Challenge: Unmet needs and water-related human insecurity
• An estimated 1.3 billion people currently lack reliable access to safe drinking water
• An estimated 2.6 billion lack adequate sanitation
• Struggle to keep pace with population growth in recent decades, much less make a dent in these figures
• Projection: Half the world’s people will live in conditions of “water insecurity” by 2035
Per-capita domestic water usePer-capita
consumption:Number of countries:
Aggregate population:
Largest countries:
< 25 lpcd 39 738 million Nigeria, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, DR
Congo
< 50 lpcd (WHO
standard)
62 2.2 billion India, Indonesia
< 100 lpcd 81 3.8 billion China, Pakistan
Source: Gleick, The World’s Water 2000-2001
Millennium Development
Goals“By 2015, cut in half the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and sanitation.”
Millennium water goals: mixed progressRegion: Drinking water: Sanitation:
Arab States n.a. n.a.
Central/Eastern Europe
Achieved n.a.
East Asia/Pacific Lagging Lagging
Latin America &
Caribbean
On track Lagging
South Asia On track Lagging
Sub-Saharan Africa
Lagging Reversal
Source: Worldwatch Institute, State of the World 2005
Challenge: Addressing water demands of competing sectoral uses
• Growing inter-sectoral competition (agriculture vs. emerging industrial, municipal uses)
• Strong growth projections across all sectors--but ineffective mechanisms for allocating water across sectors
• Controversies over water pricing and private-sector participation
Challenge: Addressing environmental impacts and in-stream uses
• importance of freshwater ecosystem services
• cumulative toll of damming, diverting, draining, dumping, developing
• 1/3 of world’s fish species endangered (vast majority are freshwater fish)
• 800k dams on world’s rivers, 500k altered for navigation
State of the world’s freshwater ecosystems
• Food production
• Water quality
• Water quantity
• Biodiversity
Condition: Capacity:
Good Mixed
Poor Decreasing
Fair Decreasing
Bad Decreasing
Source: World Resources Institute, Pilot Assessment of Global Ecosystems
• “The wars of the next century will be over water.” (Ismail Serageldin, World Bank)
• “The next Middle East war will be over dwindling water supplies.” (Moammar Gaddafi)
• “Conditions are ripe for a century of water conflicts.” (The Economist )
II. Water as a source of violent conflict
• What is the historical record?
• What likelihood of future conflict, given changing conditions?
• At what levels of social aggregation—localized, interstate, …?
• By what specific pathways?
Water and conflict: Some key questions
Gleick’s typology of historicalwater conflicts:
• Control of Water Resources: water supplies or access are at the root of tensions.
• Military Target: where water resources/systems are targets of military actions by nations or states.
• Military Tool: water resources/systems used as a weapon during a military action.
• Political Tool: water resources/systems themselves used for a political goal.
• Terrorism: water resources/systems are targets or tools of violence or coercion by non-state actors.
• Development Disputes: water resources/systems are a major source of contention/dispute in context of economic development.
Pacific Institute Water and Conflict Chronology
http://worldwater.org/conflict.htm
• Interstate conflict in shared river basins
• Violence triggered along pre-existing social cleavages (ethnicity, identity group, social class, region)
• “Developmental” states in conflict with affected domestic communities
• Coercive environmental protection or water-related restrictions
Potential pathways to water-related violent conflict
Problem: Growing water stress in the world’s river basins
• 2.3 billion people live in river basins under “water stress” (<1700 cu. meters/yr per capita)
• 1.7 billion people live in river basins under “high water stress” (<1000 cu. meters/yr per capita)
Source: World Resources Institute, World Resources 2000-2001
• 263 internationally shared river basins
• fewer than 20% have a cooperative international agreement in effect
• only a handful have accords involving all basin states
• 1997 U.N. Convention on Shared Watercourses--not in force
Problem: Thinly institutionalized cooperation on shared basins
Oregon State University “Basins at Risk” project (Wolf et al)
•50-year database of scaled cooperative and conflictual events
•Tested wide array of social, economic, political variables for causal link to conflictual/cooperative events
•Used results to identify “basins at risk”
Findings:
• Cooperative events outnumber conflictual by more than 2 to 1
• Few extreme events
• Major issues: water quantity and water infrastructure
• Variables that don’t explain much: income level, regime type, water stress (!)
Findings (cont’d):
Key is rate of change—when rate of change within basin exceeds capacity of institutions to adapt—specifically:
• “internationalized” basins
• unilateral development in the absence of international cooperative agreement
Findings (cont’d)• From this, extrapolate 17 “basins at risk”
Ganges-Brahmaputra
La Plata Orange
Han Lempa Salween
Incomati Limpopo Senegal
Kunene Mekong Tumen
Kura-Araks Ob (Ertis) Zambezi
Lake Chad Okavango
Source: Wolf et al, “International Waters: Identifying Basins at Risk,” Water Policy 5 Number 1 (2003) 29-60
Pathways to violent conflict:
• Interstate conflict in shared river basins
• Violence triggered along pre-existing social cleavages (ethnicity, identity group, social class, region)
• “Developmental” states in conflict with affected domestic communities
• Coercive environmental protection or water-related restrictions
The Homer-Dixon thesis:
• Scarcity-induced violent conflict as a result of environmental change
• Tendency of conflict to play out along pre-existing social cleavages
• “Yes, but…”: Subsequent statistical studies show weak association, low-grade violence, importance of intervening variables
Pathways to violent conflict:
• Interstate conflict in shared river basins
• Violence triggered along pre-existing social cleavages (ethnicity, identity group, social class, region)
• “Developmental” states in conflict with affected domestic communities
• Coercive environmental protection or water-related restrictions
Critical ecosystem
Anchor of local livelihoods and culture
Scarce commodity with market value
“A river plays a very big role in our culture. It has a lot to do. If somebody passes away or maybe was killed by the lightning, usually he would be buried next to the river. It is a place where our traditional doctors go to get qualified. Some people say they talk with their ancestors right in the river. If a girl is about to start her first period, a traditional way to guide her is to take her to the river. Apart from that, if someone in the family dreams about a river, it will mean that someone in the family is pregnant; and if I am a mother, I should know that something is wrong with one of my daughters.”
--Mathato Khit’sane, Highlands Church Action Group, Lesotho
Nehru: “Dams are the temples of modern India.”
Stalin: “Water which is allowed to enter the sea is wasted.”
World Commission on Dams estimates that 40-80 million people have been displaced to make way for large dams and water projects
Trends in state-society water development conflicts
• Transnationalization of opposition
• Increasing success of dam opponents (in context of greater private-sector role)
• World Commission on Dams as a forum for dialogue, conflict resolution
• Endurance of site-specific violence when movements choose confrontation and states choose repression
Pathways to violent conflict:
• Interstate conflict in shared river basins
• Violence triggered along pre-existing social cleavages (ethnicity, identity group, social class, region)
• “Developmental” states in conflict with affected domestic communities
• Coercive environmental protection or water-related restrictions
“The squatters live…next to a polluted river and the local
authority fear that it could be a source of cholera.” (BBC 2-13-01)
• International river-basin cooperation
• ‘Stakeholder’ dialogues around infrastructure and privatization controversies
• Domestic water policy reforms
III. Water Cooperation Initiatives
Principles for shared river basins (1997 U.N. Convention)
• All basin states participate
• “Equitable and reasonable use”
• Obligation to avoid “significant harm”
• Regular exchange of information
• Prior notification
• Peaceful dispute resolution
Water cooperation initiatives
• International river-basin cooperation
• ‘Stakeholder’ dialogues around infrastructure and privatization controversies
• Domestic water policy reforms
World Commission on Dams
UN Environment ProgrammeDams and Development Project
Water cooperation initiatives
• International river-basin cooperation
• ‘Stakeholder’ dialogues around infrastructure and privatization controversies
• Domestic water policy reforms
• Brazil: basin-level committees, mixed-membership bodies geared toward conflict resolution
• South Africa: human and environmental “reserves”, pricing reforms/minimum free allocation
Examples of innovative domestic water-policy reforms
Global 2000: Major Conclusions
“Regional water shortages will become more severe. In the 1970-2000 period population growth alone will cause requirements for water to double in nearly half the world. Still greater increases would be needed to improve standards of living. In many [less-developed countries], water supplies will become increasingly erratic by 2000 as a result of extensive deforestation. Development of new water supplies will become more costly virtually everywhere.”
Projected Global Water Withdrawals in Year 2000 (cu. km),
by year of forecast
0
2000
4000
6000
8000
10000
1960 1970 1980 1990 2000
Source: Adapted from Gleick, The World’s Water 2000-2001
Scenarios for global water use in 2025
scenario:
• Raskin “reference”• Seckler “BAU”
• Gleick “vision”• WWC “vision”
• Raskin “reform” • Seckler “efficiency”
projected withdrawal (cu. km/yr):
50444569
42704200
40543625
Critical variables shaping water futures:
-Population growth
-Economic growth
-Technological innovation
** Water finance trends & pricing policies
** Management of social controversies
** International river diplomacy