The document discusses the global food and water paradox of needing to produce more food with less available water resources due to population growth, increasing wealth, and climate change. It notes that water withdrawals have increased much faster than population over the 20th century. Solutions proposed to address the paradox include improving irrigation efficiency, building water storage, recycling/reuse, improving urban/industrial efficiency, water reforms, reducing food waste, and enhancing agricultural supply chains.

1. The Food and Water
Paradox
Colin Chartres
International Water Management Institute
Photo Davidvan Cakenberghe/IWMI
Photo: :Tom van Cakenberghe/IWMI
Tom Brazier/IWMI
Water for a food-secure world
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2. The Global Food and Water Paradox
Feeding c.2 billion more people
with less water for agriculture than we have now
in an era of climate change
• Two key drivers:
– Growing population, and
– Growing wealth
• Climate Change creating
uncertainty
Water for a food-secure world
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3. How has IWMI contributed?
A journey through time
and into the future
recognizing the
contribution of past and
present staff and partners
Water for a food-secure world
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4. Demography, Global GDP and Water Withdrawals
1900 - 2000
• Population increase about 3.6 times
• Water withdrawals increased 6.8 times
• GDP increased 19 times , about 3% per year (constant
prices, IMF)
GDP
Total
Agriculture
Industry
Municipal
Pop.
Acknowledgements to Jan Lundqvist, SIWI
Water for a food-secure world
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5. Poverty and Population
Population
growth,dietary
change and
poverty and
malnutrition
will be key
drivers with
Courtesy of Stan Wood, IFPRI
respect to
agriculture Pop. m Pop. m Growth
2009 2050
Africa 1010 1998 98%
Asia 4121 5231 27%
Europe 732 691 - 5%
LA and Caribbean 582 729 25%
Water for a food-secure world
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6. Drivers paint a pessimistic picture even
without climate change
• Food production to increase by 70% by 2050 (World Food
Summit, Rome)
• Additional water required under BaU up to 6000 km3
(Comprehensive Assessment 2007) - from where?
• CC may reduce potential yields in SSA and SA by 30%
by 2030 (Lobell et al, Science, 2008)
• Temperature increase may reduce yields of corn, soya
beans and cotton by 30 – 46% in the US in a century
(Schlenker & Roberts, PNAS, 2009)
Water for a food-secure world
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7. The Green Revolution was fuelled by fertilizer
and irrigation, but at a cost
2.5 320
World Bank lending for
irrigation 280
2.0
Irrigated Area
240
?
200
1.5
160
Food price index
1.0
120
Living Planet Index
Freshwater Species 80
0.5
40
0 0
1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005
Water for a food-secure world
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8. The River Basin approach
• IWMI work stressed that irrigation has to be considered in a
basin context and that other competing uses and the
environment need to be considered.
• This highlighted the significance of the IWRM approach that
had been emerging for decades.
• Studies demonstrated that some basins were rapidly “closing”
due to over extraction of water
• Water stress indicator
Areas in red are where environmental water requirements may not be met
under current usage (Smakhtin et al. 2004)
Water for a food-secure world
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9. Where does all the water go?
Thanks to David Molden
Water for a food-secure world
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10. Water Scarcity in 2000
From the Comprehensive Assessment of Water
Management in Agriculture, 2007
Water for a food-secure world
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11. More Crop Per Drop
From the Comprehensive Assessment of Water
Management in Agriculture, 2007
Water for a food-secure world
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12. Global Water Withdrawals:
historical and projected (after Peter Gleick)
Water for a food-secure world
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13. Approx. 2000 water
withdrawals
n.b. consumptive demand is less than water withdrawals due to irrigation
inefficiency
Water for a food-secure world
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14. Climate change impacts
• SRESA2 (A2) and SRESB1 (B1) IPCC scenarios show no clear trend in the total
rainfall;
• Potential evapotranspiration (PET), which is dependent upon the
temperature, increases, with sharper increase after 2040
• By 2050, for the irrigated area, the gap between PET and effective rainfall will be
about 17% higher than the baseline for the A2 climate change scenario whereas it
will be about 14% higher for B1 climate change scenario.
• This will put extra stress on demand for irrigation water.
Water for a food-secure world
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15. How can we respond to the paradox?
• Improving irrigation efficiency and water
productivity
• Building resilience in terms of storage
• Recycling and reuse
• Industrial and urban efficiency
• Water reform –
policy, governance, institutions and
regulation
• Reducing food waste
• Enhancing supply chains for the benefit of
farmers, consumers and environment
Water for a food-secure world
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16. Increase Productivity
6000
 more crop per drop in
5000 irrigated and rainfed
systems
Cereal Production per Area (Kg/ha)
Arab World
4000
Sub-Saharan Africa (developing only)
Burkina Faso
Bangladesh
3000
India
Pakistan
2000 China
Vietnam
Thailand
1000 Brazil
Colombia
0
0 200 400 600 800 1,000 1,200
Area (Km2) Thousands
Courtesy Simon Cook
Water for a food-secure world
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17. Participatory Irrigation Management(PIM)/Water
Users Associations – its all about
people, institutions and governance
• Irrigation Management Transfer (IMT)
served as the cornerstone of the
IWMI, research agenda for nearly a
decade.
• PIM is now the paradigm for irrigation
management, but there is emerging
evidence that schemes are failing when
financial support is withdrawn.
• The trend in South Asia from
government canal schemes to individual
boreholes has created anarchy and a
major groundwater management Region Success Failure
headache. S Asia 18 20
• How do we reinvigorate PIM? E Asia 7 2
SE Asia 12 24
C Asia 4 14

18. Wastewater Reuse
Can we develop effective business
models that promote safe recycling
and reuse?
Courtesy Pay Drechsel
Water for a food-secure world
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19. Sustainable intensification – the coming
challenge across many scales
• Closing the actual vs potential yield gap (on farm
issue)
• Twice the yield off half the area? (on-farm issue)
• Capitalizing on natural infrastructure (national
policy issue)
• Recognizing the value of ecosystem services
(river basin/regional level issue)
• The water-food-energy-environment nexus
(national-transboundary issue)
Water for a food-secure world
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20. Sustainable intensification – the coming
challenge across many scales
• Closing the actual vs potential yield gap (on farm
issue)
• Twice the yield off half the area? (on-farm issue)
• Capitalizing on natural infrastructure (national
policy issue)
• Recognizing the value of ecosystem services
(river basin/regional level issue)
• The water-food-energy-environment nexus
(national-transboundary issue)
Water for a food-secure world
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21. What does sustainable intensification mean?
• Minimal off-site movement of pollutants
• Maintaining downstream flows and water quality
• Utilizing natural infrastructure for water
storage, flood prevention
• Maintaining habitat for pollinators and conserving
biodiversity, forest cover and grasslands
• Sequestering carbon to improve
soils and mitigate climate change
• Maximizing energy efficiency,
minimizing water consumption,
resource reuse.
Water for a food-secure world
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22. Hot spots
Many developing countries with high population growth
and currently low agricultural productivity e.g.
• India where water demand is forecast to exceed supply by 50%
in 2030 and where the dry west has high productivity and the wet
east, lower productivity
• Pakistan, where “feudal” land tenure and water scarcity are
compounded by a predicted population increase from 169m
• to 295m in 2050
• Sub-Saharan Africa where yields continue to stagnate in the face
of a predicted 98% population increase
Water for a food-secure world
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23. Conclusions
• Food and water security issues are still
daunting in the developing world
• Business as usual paradigms have to
be replaced
• Sustainable intensification is the way
forward, but will require significant
investment in R&D, capacity
building, land and water reform
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24. Conclusions
If we combine these
approaches with reduction
of food waste we can feed 2
billion more people without
significantly increasing
agriculture’s footprint
Water for a food-secure world
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