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Monitoring The UN > The UN and Sustainable Development Freshwater
"Lack of water is one of the principal causes of delayed development. Polluted water is one of the biggest killers we know, responsible for up to 27,000 deaths a day in the world’s poorest countries." (UNEP 1996)1 Social and economic development in the past fifty years in all parts of the world has taken a tremendous toll on the Earth’s freshwater resources. As more and more countries attempt to modernize, their intensification of industry, agriculture and urban growth is all too often accompanied by the unsustainable management of their water supplies. Overexploitation of groundwater and contamination of lakes, rivers and aquifers by domestic and commercial wastes, untreated sewage, industrial effluents and agricultural chemicals are endangering the future of drinking water availability and destroying vital aquatic ecosystems.2 Development will falter if a new model is not found that emphasizes the sustainable use and management of water and assigns priority to assessing the environmental impacts of water-related practices. Conservation and pollution control have been neglected in most national planning, especially in the developing countries, because it appears to be an expensive luxury when economic prosperity is the overriding imperative. Frequently, by the time the results of this neglect have shown themselves, people are sick and water ecosystems are irreparably damaged. At that point, the cost is great indeed.3 Water policy can no longer be a rearguard action that attempts to undo what in some cases simply cannot be undone. The predicament of freshwater and development is made worse by the fact that water resources are very unevenly distributed throughout the world. Of the vast amount of water on our planet, only about 3 per cent is fresh, and a mere third of that is accessible to us. The available sources: springs, streams, rivers, lakes, and groundwater aquifiers, are fed by precipitation falling from the atmosphere - rain. However, some areas either receive very little rainfall or experience it only at certain times of the year.4 Regardless of individual water endowments, unsustainable consumption and contamination constrict supplies, and the international community has come to realize that immediate and serious action must be taken if the shortages some are already experiencing are not to become more widespread and irreversible.5 The multiple uses of water: We have many uses for freshwater. Worldwide, the largest proportion goes to agriculture, with industry coming in second and domestic use a distant third.6 Where water is not abundant, and sometimes even where it is, competition between uses can be severe. That competition is aggravated by unsustainable exploitation and contamination of supplies. Water for domestic use: Due to shortages, contamination, lack of infrastructural capacities, or deficient management, more than half the world’s people do not have adequate or safe drinking water. Most of them live in the developing countries. The figure cited by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) of 27,000 deaths a day from unsafe water is largely attributable to the very low provision of sanitation services and sewage treatment in that part of the world. Untreated sewage emptied into lakes and rivers, or seeping into the groundwater wells from which people drink creates breeding grounds for diseases like dysentery, cholera and typhoid. In sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America the problem of sewage contamination is particularly severe because they both have such low rates of sewage treatment.7 In the developed world, sanitation services and sewage treatment facilities are much more prevalent, but problem areas still exist, as do the attendant health risks. In common with most parts of the world, too, garbage dumps and toxic storage units leak poisonous substances into the soil, where they slowly make their way into surface and groundwater sources.8 Industrial water use: Industry may not consume as much water as agriculture, because it often recycles it, but it can seriously damage water quality if industrial chemicals are allowed to remain in wastewater.9 When they accumulate in lakes, rivers and underground aquifers, these chemicals have serious and long-term environmental consequences. They can poison drinking water, suffocate water habitats, and kill aquatic life.10 Industrial activity can also pollute water sources indirectly, through the release of emissions containing nitrogen and sulphur oxides into the air. The resultant ‘acid rain’ can acidify lakes and rivers over great distances, destroying their ecosystems. This has occurred with devastating effect in some areas of North America and Northwestern Europe, where industrialization is well advanced. Habitat can also be destroyed by hydroelectric projects, which return used water to the original watercourse at such high temperatures that oxygen is suppressed.11 Agricultural water use: A plus and minus equation: Irrigation accounts for most agricultural water use and has proved a mixed blessing. While it promises enhanced food security, it is too frequently wasteful and even destructive of the land it is meant to help. Irrigated lands, "although only 17 percent of the global cropland," says Gary Gardner in Vital Signs 1997, "produce 40 percent of the world’s food...[and] irrigation [is] responsible for more than half of the increase in global food production between the mid-1960s and the mid-1980s." However, it is estimated that half (or more) of irrigation water never actually reaches the crops, having been lost between the source and the destination through leakage, evaporation or seepage.12 Worldwide, the growth of irrigated areas is slowing because of water availability problems. "In many areas," claims Gardner, "water is simply unavailable for additional irrigation. Some 44 countries - most in Africa and the Middle East - are now "water-stressed,"...most cannot meet the full water needs of farmers, factories, homes, and the natural environment. When cuts in deliveries come, farmers are typically hit the hardest." Where irrigation continues, it often rests on the unsustainable pumping of underground aquifers, which refill very slowly. This is occurring in countries like Iran, China, India, and even the United States.13 While the artificial watering of crops can increase land yields and productivity, if badly managed, it can lead to the salinization or waterlogging of the soil.14 The land is then useless for further cultivation. This problem, Graeme Aplin explains in Global Environmental Crises: "is evident today in almost every large-scale flood irrigation project in the world. If the land is dry enough to require irrigation, there is a very high probability that salt is present deep in the soil. If excessive volumes of water are used, groundwater levels will rise, creating the twin problem of waterlogging and salinisation. Estimates are that today 50 per cent of the irrigated land in Iraq and Syria, 30 per cent in Egypt, 25 per cent in India, 23 per cent in Pakistan and 15 per cent in Iran is saline or waterlogged."15 Two million hectares of land are rendered uncultivable every year because of this phenomenon.16 Agricultural water use also contributes to freshwater pollution worldwide. Fertilizers (nitrates), pesticides and animal waste are washed through the soil and contaminate surface and underground sources. Concentrations of nutrients produce the "eutrophication" of lakes and rivers and "algal blooms" (seen in North America and Europe) which interfere with the oxygen retention of water.17 Groundwater: Around 97 per cent of the world’s freshwater supplies are derived from underground sources. For some countries, this is the only source. With rising populations and intensified agricultural and industrial activity, groundwater is being overexploited. Removing water from underground aquifers in unsustainable quantities and at unsustainable rates produces dry wells, land subsidence (even in cities), and the intrusion of salt water into those aquifers. The latter occurs when too rapid lowering of underground water tables in coastal areas produces a void into which the nearby sea water can seep. The damage being done to underground sources is particularly alarming because they take a long time to refill themselves and once contaminated, usually present a clean-up problem beyond our capacities to solve. Imagine the practical obstacles to de-toxifying or desalinating a large body of water residing in a pocket one hundred feet underground.18 Sedimentation: The term sedimentation refers to the silting of rivers and river basins, lakes, reservoirs, and dams. It is the product of large amounts of soil washing into watercourses as a result of unsustainable agricultural practices, overgrazing, and the deforestation of hillsides or mountain slopes. Sedimentation disrupts water habitats (destroying fisheries in the process), affects the working of dams and hydroelectric projects and clogs routes used for water transportation.19 Cross-boundary impacts of water use: Sharing water resources can be a recipe for inter-state tension, particularly where quantity and quality stresses are occurring. In much of the world, state water management can have profound transboundary consequences. As Adam Rogers explains in Taking Action: "One country’s waste disposal site may be another country’s source of drinking water. Deforestation upstream may cause floods or water shortage downstream, while a country’s hydroelectric, irrigation and public water projects may cut off its neighbour’s supply. About 40 per cent of the world’s population depends on water that flows from a neighbouring country. Of the more than 200 river systems shared by two or more countries, several have already caused international conflict."20 Conflicts over water will inevitably increase if measures are not taken to create a more sustainable relationship between humans and the water they use. Specific water issues by region Africa : This region has enormous problems in terms of both quantity and quality of water resources. The continent experiences the full range of rainfall density, but much of its land is semi-arid. In recent years, Africa’s annual rainfall has been decreasing and some parts have seen repeated droughts. Unsustainable agricultural practices and deforestation (as much due to the insatiable demand for fuelwood as for settlement land) are leaving soils in many areas incapable of holding water, affecting more than surface water supplies - groundwater aquifers are supplied from above. If the water does not have a chance to filter down, these sources also decline. Even without the problem of land degradation, Africa has been using only 4 per cent of available freshwater because economic failure, underdevelopment, poverty and population growth have mitigated against the technical and financial capacity to exploit more. Hence, accessed groundwater is being overexploited. So, too, is it being contaminated by untreated sewage at an alarming rate, and by agricultural and industrial chemicals and wastes. As a result, and of great consequence for the region’s hopes for development, Africa has the world’s highest rate of people without safe and adequate water. Not coincidentally, it also has the highest death rates from water-related infections.21 West Asia (from Iraq to North Africa): Water availability varies in the region and there is a great deal of true desert. Most countries here are deemed to be facing freshwater shortages that will only become more acute if the already high per capita consumption rates increase and the problem of contamination is not addressed. Those states with surface water, like Libya, Syria and Iraq, draw upon underground sources for the additional supplies needed to meet demand. Others, like Saudi Arabia and the desert states on the margins of the Arabian Peninsula, are almost entirely dependent upon groundwater, supplemented, perhaps, by desalination of sea water. The future of human health and of social and economic development in West Asia is going to be adversely affected if management solutions are not found that will allow its people to maximize their naturally limited water resources in a sustainable manner. Improvements will need to be made in the area of sewage treatment and general pollution control. As elsewhere, too, soils are deteriorating from the effects of irrigation and sea water is creeping into aquifers.22 Asia and the Pacific: Taken as a whole, this region is not short of water, but distribution is uneven and can be variable. Afghanistan, Iran, and parts of India and China are currently in a state of water shortage. Pollution is affecting freshwater resources in the entire area due to the dumping of untreated sewage and contamination from agricultural and industrial wastes. Salt water intrusion is a serious problem, particularly in the small island states. Land subsidence from overexploitation of aquifers is occurring in the cities of Bangkok and Jakarta. With industrialization, urbanization, and population on the increase, demand for water is only going to rise here and both quality and quantity are going to present major challenges.23 Latin America and the Caribbean: Portions of this region are situated in the tropics, but two thirds of it is semi-arid. In some areas the rainfall is seasonal and in others, "the hydrological cycle is so variable that it generates a ruinous sequence of prolonged droughts and destructive floods that make agriculture impractical." Water quality is affected by industrial pollutants, agricultural chemicals and pesticides, mining wastewater, and untreated sewage. The discharging of the latter into watercourses around the growing urban centres is of staggering proportions. Even the drug trade is contributing to water degradation. In Bolivia, Colombia and Peru, drug processors are allowing cocaine paste to wash into river tributaries. Timber harvesting has produced soil erosion, sedimentation, and the alteration of watercourses. Coastal areas are experiencing the intrusion of salt water into overexploited aquifers. The extensive irrigation that is carried on in the region has produced high levels of soil salinization and alkalization.24 North America: Though the continent has some arid regions, it is generally well endowed with freshwater sources. Drinking water quality is generally, or at least comparatively good, though problem spots exist. There is contamination from sewage and agricultural chemicals in some rural areas and acid rain has had a devastating impact on some lakes and rivers. North Americans are familiar with the term ‘dead lake’ associated with the phenomenon of acid rain. The Great Lakes system, because of the high concentration of population and agricultural and industrial activity, has experienced severe pollution problems and resulting ecosystem damage. For a number of years, the two North American nations have been cooperating in an effort to reverse this situation, and an encouraging degree of success has been attained. However, there is still some way to go to bring these freshwater bodies back to acceptable levels of health. On a per capita basis, Canada and the United States have the highest water consumption rates on Earth, partly because water is comparatively inexpensive to the consumer. Both quality and quantity are major concerns in this region because, as in so many other places, water is under pressure from exploitation and contamination from agricultural and industrial sources. Conservation, as well as protection, are, and will continue to be, important policy issues.25 Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States: Under the leadership of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, this region has shown itself to be a world leader in coordinated responses to water problems, a number of conventions having been concluded on transboundary water issues as a step toward reversing unsustainable water management practices.26 Progress has been made, but vigilance is still required. Quantity and quality problems remain. Water distribution and consumption rates are variable. So are levels of national development. There are some areas where untreated sewage is still entering watercourses and cases of cholera and typhoid have been recorded (e.g. Latvia and Albania). There also continue to be occurrences of lake acidification as well as areas showing dangerous levels of phosphorous, nitrogen, and heavy metal contamination. Tragically, Russia’s magnificent Lake Baikal, home to a unique aquatic ecosystem (and 20 per cent of the world’s freshwater), is being contaminated by industrial effluents.27 Groundwater overexploitation is a concern here. According to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP): "About 60 per cent of European industrial and urban centres are close to areas where ground water is overexploited, and some are experiencing water shortages as a result: 25 per cent of wetlands west of the Urals are threatened by lowered ground-water tables, and extensive tracts of the Mediterranean, Baltic, and Black Sea coasts are suffering from salt intrusion in ground-water supplies."28 What is the United Nations doing to meet the challenge of global freshwater management? The United Nations first began to study water issues in the 1950s, through the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). In 1975, prompted by recent catastrophic droughts in the Sahel region of Africa, UNESCO established the International Hydrological Programme (IHP). Its purpose was to address and highlight the connection between human activities and water resource health, so as to arrive at better management solutions that would ward off future disasters. IHP was renewed and carried on into the 1990s.29 In 1977, the United Nations held an international water conference in Mar del Plata, Argentina which produced an Action Plan (IHP-III) to promote international conservation and management of freshwater. This Plan was to involve both the United Nations system and national governments. Its conservation and management principles were to be integrated into national and international development efforts with the assistance of the United Nations specialized agencies (WHO, UNESCO, WMO, FAO, and IAEA), the United Nations Regional Commissions, the World Bank, UNICEF and UNEP. The latter was to act as coordinator.30 That same year, the United Nations established GEMS, a Global Environment Monitoring System involving UNESCO, WHO, WMO, and UNEP. Its function is to monitor, gather data upon, and assess global water quality through a worldwide network of monitoring stations.31 The terrible water-related health problems in the developing world prompted the United Nations to designate the 1980s as the International Drinking Water Supply and Sanitation Decade (IDWSSD). The goal of the Decade was a dramatic reduction in the number of the world’s people lacking access to safe drinking water and a significant improvement in global sanitation facilities. Unfortunately, results fell far short of the ambitious objective of "providing half a million people a day with new or improved services..."32 As Mostafa Tolba, former Executive Director of UNEP, explains: "The slow progress towards achieving the goals of IDWSSD, particularly in urban areas, has been attributed to several factors, including population growth, rural-urban migration, the unfavourable world economic situation and the debt burden of developing countries, which has been a major obstacle to investment in infrastructure projects. However, enough knowledge and experience has been gained to reach the goal of IDWSSD by the end of the century, provided that adequate investment is made available coupled with the provision of low-cost technologies and wider public participation."33 UNCED Global water problems continued to mount. In January, 1992, an International Conference on Water and Environment was held in Dublin, Ireland. In June, water issues were on the agenda of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro. At that meeting, it was reaffirmed that an integrated approach to water management was needed that acknowledged the imperatives of conservation and maintenance of water quality, and recognized the competing demands placed on supplies. Also emphasized was the place of sound policy and environmental impact assessments. It was not lost on those gathered at this ‘Earth Summit’ that sustainable development, the theme of the conference, would be thwarted if sustainable water management was not achieved. Chapter 18 of UNCED’s Plan of Action, Agenda 21, provides a comprehensive appraisal of global water issues and argues that the key, and the challenge, is to ensure that present and future generations have adequate supplies of freshwater without disrupting the natural hydrological cycle or damaging Earth’s ecosystems. The practical approach recommended to bring this about was that of "integrated water resources planning and management," integrated in the sense of attending to both surface and underground sources and in terms of maintaining an awareness of the multiple uses to which these sources are put. Mention is also made of the need for states to cooperate in the management and protection of transboundary water resources.34 Seven programme areas are proposed: 1. "Integrated water resources development and management" suggests that nations attempt to centralize and coordinate water planning strategies that recognize the importance of water quality and quantity to ecosystems and to sustainable economic and social development. These attempts are to include an acknowledgment of the need for proper costing of water supplies, conservation, and a long-term policy focus. 2."Water resources assessment" is to aim for long-term sustainability through an identification of areas where action is or might be needed, such as likely flooding or drought. Forecasting, data collection and projections are promoted as a basis upon which to formulate appropriate policies. The whole endeavour is to rest upon efficient and effective coordination of actors, appropriate technology, adequate financial resources, and the strengthening of related institutions. 3."Protection of water resources, water quality and aquatic ecosystems" suggests an emphasis on prevention through environmentally-conscious development models and public education efforts. 4. "Drinking-water supply and sanitation" is aimed especially at the problems in the developing world, where water-related diseases have taken such an enormous toll on human life and productivity. It is suggested that the setting of national targets for improvements in this area would be the most constructive approach. 5. "Water and urban development." With urbanization growing apace in most parts of the world (soon 50 per cent of the world’s people will be urban), the capacity of local and national authorities to provide safe water, sanitation and pollution control, especially financially-handicapped developing countries, is overwhelmed. It is noted that: "Better management of urban water resources, including the elimination of unsustainable consumption patterns, can make a substantial contribution to the alleviation of poverty and improvement of the health and quality of life of the urban and rural poor. A high proportion of large urban agglomerations are located around estuaries and in coastal zones. Such an arrangement leads to pollution from municipal and industrial discharges combined with overexploitation of available water resources and threatens the marine environment and the supply of freshwater resources." The goal of this programme area is to help Member governments with development strategies that will ensure sustained water supplies and minimize the environmental fall-out of human concentrations. 6. "Water for sustainable food production and rural development" is a programme element that rests on the connection between water and food security, and agriculture and the larger supply issue. Because agriculture is the largest consumer of water, increased efficiency in that sector can contribute to greater availability elsewhere. The objective is to manage water so that all areas of demand can be met and development can take place. Member states are to make more efficient use of rain-fed land and improve irrigation techniques so as to also avoid soil degradation through salinization and waterlogging. To promote sustainable water management, environmental impact assessments should be made in the planning stage of irrigation projects. 7."Impacts of climate change on water resources" is an area where as yet little is definitively known. Member states are encouraged to study the connection and to accumulate information so that, if possible and if necessary, they can be ready for pre-emptive action.35 On-going work and study: The United Nations continues to work on promoting the sustainable management of freshwater resources through its various bodies, including the Commission on Sustainable Development, and its specialized agencies. UNEP, as coordinator of United Nations environmental policy, actively encourages sound water management and planning as part of the United Nations capacity-building efforts amongst Member states. It also strongly endorses and promotes international water management cooperation. As a result of international activities, awareness of freshwater issues has been enhanced, and there have even been success stories. Nonetheless, the severe problems that remain will call for on-going United Nations effort and Member state commitment. Link to CSD, FORESTS, and POVERTY on this site. The United Nations Sustainable Development site carries a fair amount of information on freshwater as an issue, including numerous relevant documents. Once the Sustainable Development site is reached, click on Issues/Freshwater. This will lead to further links to documents of the CSD, reports of the Secretary-General, National Reports to the CSD, and related web sites (organizations within the United Nations system that deal with freshwater issues as part of their activities). There is also a very accessible reproduction of Agenda 21 which allows easy selection of the chapter of interest, The Issues/Freshwater address is: http://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/water.htm For reports submitted by the Government of Canada to the Commission on Sustainable Development, which include the freshwater issue, see: http://www.un.org/agenda21/natinfo/countr/canada/natur.htm#freshw Resources 1 United Nations Environment Programme, Groundwater: A Threatened Resource, UNEP Environment Library No 15 (Nairobi: United Nations Environment Programme, 1996) 3. 2 see Adam Rogers, ed., Taking Action: An Environmental Guide for You and Your Community (Nairobi: United Nations Environment Programme, 1995) 137-142; United Nations Environment Programme, The Pollution of Lakes and Reservoirs, UNEP Environment Library No 12 (Nairobi: United Nations Environment Programme, 1994) 4-5; and United Nations Environment Programme, Groundwater: A Threatened Resource, 3. 3 United Nations Environment Programme, Groundwater: A Threatened Resource, 4-5; Tolba, Saving Our Planet: Challenges and Hopes (London: Chapman & Hall, 1992) 49; and Rogers, 142. 4Ibid.; United Nations Environment Programme, Safeguarding the World’s Water, UNEP Environment Brief No 6 (Nairobi: United Nations Environment Programme, 1988 (?))1-2; and Rogers, 139. 5 Ibid., 85-86. 6 Mostafa K. Tolba, The World Environment 1972-1992: Two Decades of Challenge (London: Chapman & Hall, 1992) 85; and Ibid., Saving Our Planet, 46-47. 7 United Nations Environment Programme, Freshwater Pollution, UNEP/GEMS Environment Library No. 6 (Nairobi: United Nations Environment Programme, 1991) 4; Rogers, 138; and Tolba, Saving Our Planet 49 and The World Environment 1972-1992, 95. 8 Tolba, Saving Our Planet, 47. 9 Tolba, The World Environment 1972-1992, 97; and United Nations Environment Programme, Safeguarding the World’s Water, 2. 10 United Nations Environment Programme, Safeguarding the World’s Water, 2, Groundwater: A Threatened Resource, 3; and Tolba, Saving Our Planet, 49. 11 Tolba, The World Environment 1972-1992, 90-91; United Nations Environment Programme, Freshwater Pollution, 4-5; and Rogers, 137. 12 Gary Gardner, "Irrigated Area Up Slightly," Vital Signs 1997: The Environmental Trends That Are Shaping Our Future, Lester R. Brown, Michael Renner, and Christopher Flavin, ed. Linda Starke (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1997) 42; and Tolba, The World Environment 1972-1992, 93. 13 Gardner, 42. 14 Tolba, The World Environment 1972-1992, 94. 15 Graeme Aplin, et al., Global Environmental Crises: An Australian Perspective (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1995) 54. 16 Gardner, 42. 17 Tolba, The World Environment 1972-1992, 91-92; and United Nations Environment Programme, Groundwater: A Threatened Resource, 3-4, and Safeguarding the World’s Water, 3. 18 United Nations Environment Programme, Groundwater: A Threatened Resource, 3-5; and Rogers, 140, 142. 19 Tolba, The World Environment 1972-1992, 93-94; and United Nations Environment Programme, Safeguarding the World’s Water, 2. 20 Rogers, 140. 21 the information contained here is a summary of that presented in: United Nations Environment Programme, Global Environment Outlook (New York: United Nations Environment Programme (Oxford University Press), 1997) 30-32. 22 Ibid., 108-110. 23 Ibid., 45-46. 24 Ibid., 84-85. 25 Ibid., 98-100. 26 see Tolba, Saving Our Planet, 50. 27 summary United Nations Environment Programme, Global Environment Outlook, 65-67. 28 Ibid., 66. 29 United Nations Environment Programme, Safeguarding the World’s Water, 4. 30 Ibid. 31 United Nations Environment Programme, Freshwater Pollution, 4. 32 Tolba, Saving Our Planet, 53; and United Nations Environment Programme, Safeguarding the World’s Water, 5. 33 Tolba, Saving Our Planet, 53. 34 United Nations, Chapter 18, Report of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development [Agenda 21] @ http://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/agenda21chapter18.htm, 1. 35 Ibid., 1-18. |
