Water Scarcity Crisis
21 August 2019
According to a new report by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that focuses on the interaction between climate change, desertification and food security, if present land use habits are maintained, the planet’s capacity to produce food will drop drastically.
Yield reductions caused by climate change are already an acute problem for a number of countries. According to the IPCC report, about half a billion people live in areas currently undergoing desertification, and approximately one tenth of the planet’s population are undernourished. Famine leads to social tension and may catalyse waves of migration.
According to the report, the degradation of fertile land is proceeding a hundred times faster than its regeneration – and along with human activities, the weather anomalies caused by climate change are also destroying soil.
At present, 72 percent of the planet’s land area is suitable for human habitation. Food production is responsible for 21–37 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, and in many instances the forests that could store carbon are being cleared to use land for food production. The report recommends switching to less environmentally damaging forms of farming instead of industrial food production in order to improve the situation, and it also emphasises the importance of planting forests.
said Dave Reay, a professor at the University of Edinburgh, who was an expert reviewer of the report.
This year’s was the third hottest summer in Germany since the beginning of regular meteorological records in 1881, according to preliminary data from the Federal Meteorological Service.
In 2011, Laguna de Aculeo, one of the country’s favourite bathing resorts, still covered 12 square kilometres, and the lake was 6 metres deep – but since then, it has completely dried out.
The problem of the water shortages caused by global warming is much more complex than we have thought. In some parts of Africa, people not only need to face thirst but also the fact that the regions impacted by drought emit a quantity of carbon dioxide equivalent to the emissions of two hundred million cars each year.
The EU is contributing a further 50 million euro to alleviate drought damage in a number of Eastern and Central African countries. According to estimates, more than 4 million children and about 3 million pregnant women and breastfeeding mothers are undernourished in the region.
According to a report from the World Resources Institute, 17 countries are facing extremely high water stress, from India through Israel to Botswana. Many of the countries in question – which, collectively, are home to a quarter of the world’s population – are in the Middle East and North Africa.
Drought in the South African country that largely relies on hydroelectric power is causing not only shortages of drinking water but also power outages of up to 16 hours a day in the capital.
The water yield of the River Nile is becoming increasingly erratic as a result of climate change, which may have very grave consequences for Egypt.
Unprecedented droughts, heat waves claiming more than a hundred lives: the summer of 2019 has made it clear for the whole world that India is in big trouble. How will climate change shape the future of the country?
Climate change is increasingly making itself felt in Europe, too: flash floods, heat waves, droughts and forest fires are on the rise on the continent.
Water shortages represent one of the most severe consequences of global warming, impacting growing numbers of people. In 2018, the Cape Town water crisis made global news. This year so far, the situation is the worst in India: millions are struggling to get water day after day.
