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ACTION URGED ON WATER SHORTAGES

By 2025, two-thirds of the world’s population could be living in countries that face a serious shortage of water, the United Nations will warn today.

At the launch of the International Year of Freshwater, the UN will call on governments, businesses and communities for co-ordinated action to improve access to drinking water and sanitation for billions of people.

“Water is likely to become a growing source of tension and fierce competition between nations if present trends continue, but it can also be a catalyst for co-operation,” said Kofi Annan, the UN secretary-general.

“Water poverty” has a strong connection with “income poverty”, according to a newly launched Water Poverty Index, developed by World Water Council, an international think-tank, and the UK’s Centre for Ecology and Hydrology.

The researchers graded 147 countries according to five different measures – resources, access, capacity, use and environmental impact – to show which countries have the best and worst water situation.

The countries lowest on the index – Haiti, Niger, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Malawi, Djibouti, Chad, Benin, Rwanda and Burundi – are in the developing world.

But some of the world’s richest countries, such as the US and Japan, scored poorly in the water rankings, while two developing countries, Guyana and Surinam, were deemed to be among the world top 10 water-rich countries.

The US received a relatively low ranking, at 32, because it was deemed to be inefficient at using water, with the highest per capita water consumption.

The highest-ranking countries were Finland, Canada, Iceland, Norway, Guyana, Surinam, Austria, Ireland, Sweden and Switzerland.

THE FINANCIAL TIMES, Dec. 12, 2002