Why It's Clear There is a Worldwide Water Crisis

Senator John Kerry is part of Change.org's Changemakers network, comprised of leading voices for social change. He chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Seventy percent of the Earth's surface is water. So not surprisingly, disputes over access to water have defined relationships between states and nations across the world, as much in the American Southwest as in the Ancient Middle East. Coastal communities try to cope  with the devastating effects of too much water, while many agricultural communities constantly worry about having too little. Americans debate the environmental impacts of bottled water, while many in developing nations struggle to find water clean enough to drink.

Whatever the particular problem, it's clear there is a worldwide water crisis. Water use has been growing at more than twice the rate of population in the last century, and although we're not in danger of running out, an increasing number of regions are chronically short of water. Nearly 20 percent of the world's population lives in areas where water is scarce and almost another quarter in areas so poor that they lack the resources and infrastructure to extract water from rivers and aquifers.

Why should we care? Because water-borne pathogens kill more than 4,000 children every single day—diarrhea alone kills close to two million children under the age of five each year. Important watersheds are becoming overpopulated and overdeveloped. And water-related natural disasters are occurring with ever greater frequency and ferocity.

Today's Blog Action Day is a great contribution to the discussion. Our world's health and security is completely intertwined with the water resources of our planet, and this incredibly complex issue needs the full attention of us all.

The issue is complicated by the growing threat of global climate change. As our planet's climate becomes increasingly unstable, it's changing our relationship with water in dangerous and potentially catastrophic ways. In many ways, water is where the negative effects of climate change will be felt the most. Take, for example, the glaciers that provide vital water for many countries. Just imagine the consequences if suddenly India and Pakistan, two nuclear-armed powers, have to fight over diminishing water resources. The national security implications of this looming water shortage, exacerbated and directly caused by climate instability, will be felt all over the world. There are 263 known water basins that are shared by two or more countries, including the territory of 145 countries and cover half the Earth's land surface. And that's in addition to the approximately 270 aquifers that cross the borders of countries. As water gets more and more precious, there's an enormous potential for dispute and conflict.

Our water cycle, the pace of evaporation and precipitation, is already being affected. Earlier this month, a team from the University of California at Irvine found that flows in the world's rivers have spiked noticeably in the last decade, clear evidence that the water cycle is intensifying. Already, the direct cost of natural disasters has gone up 500 percent in the last two decades. And the people hit hardest are often among the world's poorest. In Kenya alone, evidence suggests that the combined impact of the winter floods of 1997 and 1998 and the drought between 1998 and 2008 has cost that country nearly a quarter of its GDP.

Now, while it's very difficult to blame the instability of our climate for one specific storm, what we do know is this: The number of storms is growing and they are becoming more severe, a trend that will only accelerate. Pakistan was recently hit by an incredible water catastrophe that left millions of people homeless. I toured the area during the height of the flood and the sight was astounding. An area larger than New England, New York, and New Jersey combined, was affected and the human suffering was incalculable.

Along with the sharp spikes of natural disasters, runaway climate change will force us to deal with the slow, remorseless rise of our world's sea level.  Coastal communities around the world will be devastated, and some of the low-lying islands around the world will become uninhabitable.  As a result, the International Panel on Climate Change has projected that substantial population displacement will happen over the next 30 to 50 years.  The displacement in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina could be just a preview of what will happen around the world.

But it doesn't have to be this way. First, we need to take action on curbing the carbon pollution that contributes to climate change. I fought hard for that in the Senate, and that fight's not done. President Obama has already signaled that getting a new clean energy economy that will cut our carbon pollution will be one of his top priorities for the next Congress.

But you don't need to wait for Congress to act. Just last weekend, on 10/10/10, there was a global day of action, where people around the world took concrete actions to reduce carbon emissions. You can work on your home to make it more efficient, or organize a drive to make your local government and business buildings use less energy. Only if we all pull together on this will we get the kind of rapid, systemic change we need.

And while we slow the rate of carbon emissions to get a handle on the real costs of climate change, we can work to understand and deal with the effects we're already feeling. Conservation of water is something that all of us need to start taking seriously, not just those in dry areas. Already, areas of scarcity, like regions within Australia and California, are finding innovative ways to minimize their use of water, and this is something all of us should be doing. We should also look at ways to beef up our monitoring of surface and ground water flows and reserves so we can accurately know how much we are using and what is left. Let's take a closer look at some of the innovative new farming techniques that use less water to see how effective they are, and encourage the switch to less water-intensive crops when it's appropriate.

Look, there's no way to sugar coat this: This issue poses a serious danger, and we need to get going right away in dealing with it. Days like today are a great way to help get people focused on this issue, but I urge everyone to make sure this is not just one day, that we keep this conversation going and do the work necessary to make sure that we build a sustainable future for water on our planet.

Photo credit: lazlo-photo via Flickr