Resource wars

[Al-khiyal]

Across the world, they are coming: the water wars. From Israel to India, from Turkey to Botswana, arguments are going on over disputed water supplies that may soon burst into open conflict.

Yesterday, Britain's Defence Secretary, John Reid, pointed to the factor hastening the violent collision between a rising world population and a shrinking world water resource: global warming.

In a grim first intervention in the climate-change debate, the Defence Secretary issued a bleak forecast that violence and political conflict would become more likely in the next 20 to 30 years as climate change turned land into desert, melted ice fields and poisoned water supplies.

Climate campaigners echoed Mr Reid's warning, and demanded that ministers redouble their efforts to curb carbon emissions.

Tony Blair will today host a crisis Downing Street summit to address what he called "the major long-term threat facing our planet", signalling alarm within Government at the political consequences of failing to deal with the spectre of global warming....

Armed forces are put on standby to tackle threat of wars over water


Turkey is increasingly using the water of the Euphrates and Tigris in a manner that augurs severe consequences for Syria and Iraq. Israel occupies the Golan Heights to control water flow. Ethiopia is planning to use more Nile water for itself and this will lead to the ruination of significant areas of agriculture in Egypt's desert plantations.

In the past climate changes lead to the migration of perhaps a few million people, the coming changes will probably lead to tens, even hundreds of millions of people moving around. Conflicts are virtually guaranteed.

So what are a few thousand British/European/Western soldiers going to do about this? Why should they intervene at all? How?

If nomads lose their grassland to the desert and move into areas where other people have settled (e.g. Sudan), what can the West do about this, except maybe kill either the settlers or the nomads? The grassland will not be coming back.

Should the West send armies to fight Bangladeshis who move north into China or to stop Chinese and Mongols moving into Siberia?

"Values" or "enlightenment" don't make Western societies in any way superior in solving these problems. So what can Western armies do about this?

Resource wars. It would be interesting to learn what the 'crisis meeting' is really about.

[Al-khiyal]

A PLAN to build an oil pipeline that green activists and many experts say could severely damage Lake Baikal, the world’s deepest freshwater lake, has been approved by Russia’s environmental watchdog.
Transneft, the state pipeline monopoly, is proposing to build the $11 billion (£6.3 billion) pipeline from Eastern Siberia to the Pacific Coast, via the Chinese border, to supply oil-thirsty Asian markets.

The proposed route comes within 800m of Baikal, a Russian national treasure and a Unesco World Heritage Site that contains 20 per cent of the world’s unfrozen fresh water. Environmental activists said that they would fight the decision in the courts and organise protests in defence of Baikal, which is home to hundreds of species and revered by local ethnic minorities....

Thirst for oil threatens a fifth of the world's fresh water

[Al-khiyal]

U.N.: More than a billion lack clean water

[Al-khiyal]

It's official: the era of resource wars is upon us. In a major London address, British Defense Secretary John Reid warned that global climate change and dwindling natural resources are combining to increase the likelihood of violent conflict over land, water and energy. Climate change, he indicated, “will make scarce resources, clean water, viable agricultural land even scarcer”—and this will “make the emergence of violent conflict more rather than less likely.”

Although not unprecedented, Reid’s prediction of an upsurge in resource conflict is significant both because of his senior rank and the vehemence of his remarks. “The blunt truth is that the lack of water and agricultural land is a significant contributory factor to the tragic conflict we see unfolding in Darfur,” he declared. “We should see this as a warning sign.”

Resource conflicts of this type are most likely to arise in the developing world, Reid indicated, but the more advanced and affluent countries are not likely to be spared the damaging and destabilizing effects of global climate change. With sea levels rising, water and energy becoming increasingly scarce and prime agricultural lands turning into deserts, internecine warfare over access to vital resources will become a global phenomenon....

The coming resource wars

[Al-khiyal]

MEXICO CITY - Water is worth fighting for — even to the death, activists holding an "alternate" forum outside the world water summit said Friday.

That attitude might seem strange in developed countries, where water flows at the touch of a faucet. But it isn't nearly as accessible in the developing world.

And water wars aren't an apocalyptic vision of the future. They're already starting to happen, the protesters say.

"We've been beaten, we've been jailed, some of us have even been killed, but we're not going to give up," said Marco Suastegui, who marched alongside about 10,000 protesters Thursday outside a convention center where the international Fourth World Water Forum is being held....

Activists pledge to fight for their water

[Al-khiyal]

The Sheonath river, a stretch of which has been leased to Radius Water Limited, in Durg district of Chhattisgarh.

The corporate hijack of water is on and if the current trend continues, India's water sources will be in private hands before long:

Thirst for profit

[Al-khiyal]

A third of the world’s population is suffering from a shortage of water, raising the prospect of “water crises” in countries such as China, India and the US.

Scientists had forecast in 2000 that one in three would face water shortages by 2025, but water experts have been shocked to find that this threshold has already been crossed.

Frank Rijsberman, director-general of the International Water Management Institute, said: “We will have to change business as usual in order to deal with the growing water scarcity crisis.”

About a quarter of the world’s population lives in areas of “physical water shortage”, where natural forces, over-use and poor agricultural practices have led to falling groundwater levels and rivers drying up. But a further 1bn people face “economic water shortages”, because [they] lack the necessary infrastructure to take water from rivers and aquifers.

The findings come from a report compiled by 700 experts over five years, the Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture from the International Water Management Institute, presented on Monday at World Water Week in Stockholm, an international meeting of water experts.

David Molden, co-ordinator of the report, said: “If we continue to manage water in the way we do now, there will more problems with scarcity.”

He said agricultural practices could easily be improved to reduce the wastage of water.

Farming uses up 70 times more water than is used for domestic purposes such as cooking and washing. In Thailand, the amount of water used to grow food is about 2,800 litres per person per day. In Italy, about 3,300 litres are required to produce each person’s food every day, of which about half goes on making ham and cheese and a third to pasta and bread.

Shortages of water are already biting in countries such as Egypt, which imports more than half of its food because it lacks enough water to grow more. In Australia, there is a water shortage in the Murray-Darling basin because so much has been diverted for use in agriculture. In the US, there are increasing disputes with Mexico over the sinking levels of water in the Colorado river.

Water shortages are compounded by corruption, according to Transparency International. David Nussbaum, chief executive, said between 20 and 40 per cent of total investment in the water sector “does not flow to the people who should be getting the clean water and sanitation”.

He said big water projects, such as the construction of water networks and treatment facilities, were subject to corruption on a grand scale, but that petty corruption was also common, for instance in cases of people paying bribes to have their water bills reduced.

The result of both was that it cost poor people more to get access to water, he said.

But he pointed to the success of a high-profile water “integrity pact” developed in Karachi in Pakistan since 2002 and completed in May this year, as an example of how water projects could be made more transparent. He said the pact had saved at least $3m that would otherwise have been lost to corruption.

Water scarcity affects one in three