Water is essential for life, yet its availability is increasingly threatened by climate change, over-exploitation, and poor management, leading to conflicts and environmental issues. While 97% of the Earth's water is salty, only 3% is fresh, and even this is not easily accessible; overuse of groundwater can result in subsidence and lowered water tables. Regional disputes, such as those in Yemen, the Nile Basin, and between Afghanistan and Iran, highlight the complex geopolitical tensions surrounding water resources.

1. Water
Resources
RAJESHWARIJAGADISH
BMSCCM

2. Water is indispensable to human life.
Though plentiful, it is limited and global demand for freshwater has
been growing rapidly due to population growth and greater affluence.
At the same time, climate change and environmental degradation are
altering the regional and seasonal availability and quality of water.
The resulting competition over water use may lead to conflict and
sometimes violence, though researchers emphasize that it is rarely the
lack of water as such that fuels conflict, but rather its governance and
management.

3. ⚫ Out of the total water reserves of the world, about 97% is salty water,
most of the animals and plants have 60-65% water in their body.
⚫ Only 3% is fresh water. Even this small fraction of fresh water is not
available to us as most of it is locked up in polar ice caps and just
0.003% is readily available to us in the form of groundwater and
surface water

4. Water is characterized by certain
unique features which make
it a marvelous resource:
⚫It exists as a liquid over a wide range
of temperature i.e. from 0°
to100°C.
⚫It has the highest specific heat, due to
which it warms up and cools down very
slowly without causing shocks of
temperature jerks to the aquatic life.
⚫It has a high latent heat of vaporization
Hence, it takes a huge amount of
energy for getting vaporized. That’s
why it produces a cooling effect as it
evaporates.

5. ⚫ It is an excellent solvent for
nutrients. Thus, it can serve as a
very good carrier of nutrients, including oxygen,
which are essential for life. But, it
can also easily dissolve various pollutants
and become a carrier of
pathogenic microorganisms.
⚫ Due to high surface tension and cohesion
it can easily rise through great
heights through the trunk even in the of the
trees like Sequoia.

6. ⚫ It has an anomalous expansion behavior i.e. as it freezes, it
expands instead of contracting and thus becomes lighter.
It is because of this property that even in
extreme cold, the lakes freeze only on the
surface. Being lighter the ice keeps floating,
whereas the bottom waters remain at a higher
temperature and therefore, can sustain aquatic organisms
even in extreme cold.

7. Water useand
Over-exploitation
⚫ Due to its unique properties water is of multiple uses for all
living organisms.
⚫ Water is absolutely essential for life.
⚫ Most of the life processes take place in contained in
the body.
⚫ Uptake of nutrients, their distribution in the body,
regulation of temperature, and removal of wastes are all
mediated through water.
⚫ Human beings depend on water for al
mos
t every developmental
activity.
⚫ Water is used for drinking, irrigation, transportation, washing
and waste disposal for industries and used as a coolant f
o
r

8. Groundwater
⚫ About 9.86% of the total fresh water resources is in the
form of groundwater and it is about 35-50 times that of
surface water supplies.
⚫ Till some time back groundwater was to be very pure.
⚫ However, of late, even groundwater aquifers been found to
be contaminated.
⚫ A layer of sediment or rock that is highly
permeable and contains water is called an
aquifer.

9. ⚫ Aquifers may be of two types:
⚫ Unconfined aquifers which are overlaid by permeable earth materials
and they are recharged by water seeping down from abovei
n
the form of
rainfall and snow melt.
⚫ Confined aquifers which are sandwiched between two i
layers of rock
or sediments and are recharged only in those areas where
the aquifer intersects the land surface. Sometimes the recharged
area is hundreds of kilometers away from the location of the well

10. EffectsofGroundwaterUsage
⚫ Subsidence: When groundwater withdrawal i
s more
than its recharge rate, the sediments in
the aquifer get compacted, a phenomenon known
as ground subsidence. Huge economic losses may
occur due to this phenomenon because it results in the
sinking of overlying land surface. The common problems
associated with it include structural damage in
buildings, fracture in pipes, reversing the flow of sewers and
canals and tidal flooding.
⚫ Lowering of water table: Mining of groundwater is
extensively in arid and semi- arid regions for irrigating
crop fields. However, it is not advisable to do excessive
mining as it would cause a sharp decline in future agricultural
production, due to lowering of water table.

12. FLOODS
⚫ Heavy rainfall often causes floods in the low-lying coastal
areas.
⚫ Prolonged downpour can cause the over-flowing of lakes and
rivers resulting into floods.
⚫ Deforestation, overgrazing, rapid industrialization, global warming
etc. have also contributed largely to a sharp rise in the
incidence of floods, which otherwise is a natural disaster.

13. DROUGHTS
⚫ When annual rainfall is below and less
than evaporation, drought
conditions are created.
⚫ Ironically, these drought- hit areas are having a high
population growth
which leads to poor land use and the situation worse.

14. ⚫ Anthropogenic causes:
Drought is a
phenomenon, but due to
several anthropogenic
causes like over grazing,
deforestation, mining etc.
there is spreading
of the deserts tending
to convert more
areas to drought affected
areas.
⚫ Erroneous and
intensive pattern
and increased
exploitation of scarce
water resources through well
or canal irrigation to
get high productivity

15. Remedial measures:
⚫Indigenous knowledge in of drought and
desertification
can be very useful for dealing with the problem.
⚫Carefully selected mixed help
optimize production and minimize the risks of crop
failures.
⚫Social Forestry and development can prove
quite effective to fight the problem, but it should
be based on proper understanding of
ecological requirements and natural process.

16. TRADITIONALWATERMANAGEMENTSYSTEM
⚫ In India, even today, there are s
e
v
e
r
a
l villages where water
management
is done not by the Irrigation but by local managers.
⚫ In south India, a neerkatti manages
the tanks very efficiently based on his/her
knowledge of the terrain, drainage
and irrigation needs.
⚫ They usually give preference to the end fields and
decide per capita allocation of water based on the
stock of available water in the tank and crop needs.
⚫ In Maharashtra, the water mangers are havaldars or jaghyas
who manage and resolve conflicts by overseeing the water
channels from main canal to the distributor canals

17. ⚫In Ladakh, the water manager is as churpun who
has got complete charge with full powers over allocation
of available water.
⚫The major source of water melt water
from glaciers and snow supplementary by water
from springs and marshes.
⚫The water is distributed different
fields through an intricate network of earthen
channels.

19. 2. Water shortages and public discontent in
Yemen
As a consequence of severe mismanagement,
Yemen’s water availability is declining
dramatically. The impacts on the people are
unequally distributed, and corruption and
nepotism are at the core of this imbalance.
This has increasingly frustrated the
disadvantaged, with water scarcity playing a
role in fuelling the political and security crisis
in Yemen.

20. 1. Dispute over water in the Nile Basin
The Nile basin features significant conflict over access to and rights over
the Nile water resources among its eleven riparian countries. The Nile
Basin Initiative (NBI), founded by 9 out of 10 riparian countries in 1999
with backing from major donor institutions, has achieved some
successes in its attempts to strengthen cooperation. Yet, since 2007,
diverging interests between upstream and downstream countries have
brought negotiations to a standstill, pitting Egypt (and, to a lesser
extent, Sudan) against upstream riparians, especially Ethiopia. In 2015,
trilateral negotiations between these countries over a major dam under
construction in
Ethiopia led to a
framework agreement
that may, in time,
prepare the ground for a
broader agreement.

21. 3. Turkey, Syria and Iraq: conflict over the Euphrates-Tigris
The Euphrates-Tigris Basin is shared between Turkey, Syria and Iraq,
with Iran comprising parts of the Tigris basin. Since the 1960s, unilateral
irrigation plans altering the flows of the rivers, coupled with political
tensions between the countries, have strained relations in the basin.
Disputes have prevented the
three governments from
effectively co-managing the
basin’s rivers. Although
cooperation efforts were
renewed in the 2000s, these
have yet to result in a formal
agreement on managing the
basin waters.

22. Afghanistan’s efforts to harness the waters of the
Helmand River and the Harirud to support post-
conflict reconstruction and development have
alarmed Iran.
The Iranian government perceives Afghanistan’s
agricultural expansion and dam construction
activities as threats to water security in its eastern
and northeastern provinces.
With a largely ineffective water treaty in place,
cooperative initiatives have not yet achieved a
breakthrough.
Afghanistan’s reluctance to engage in water
negotiations, coupled with Iran’s alleged
“paradoxical” activities of support vs. disruption,
have further complicated the resolution of
transboundary water disputes between the two
countries.
4. Transboundary water disputes between
Afghanistan and Iran

23. The Mekong basin is witnessing an enormous
expansion of dam-building for hydropower
generation, especially in China and Laos. This has
led to diplomatic tensions as countries downstream
of the dams fear the negative impacts they may
bring about, from greater flooding to seasonal lack
of water. The Mekong River Commission’s (MRC)
effectiveness in resolving these tensions has so far
been limited due to its lack of enforcement powers
and China’s reluctance to join as a full member.
Instead of joining the MRC, China is trying to
engage with downstream riparians by proposing
alternative institutional mechanisms and offering
assistance for dam construction downstream in the
Lower Mekong basin. However, without more
formalized cooperation, especially between the
lower riparians and China, contemporary dam-
building activities might continue to act as a
destabilizing force in the Mekong River Basin.
5. Dam projects and disputes in
the Mekong River Basin

24. The long-standing conflict over water
from the Cauvery River between the
Indian states Karnataka and Tamil Nadu
has recently resurfaced in the context of
drier climate conditions. The implications
are not only legal battles, but also violent
protests following decisions to alter water
distribution between the two states.
6. Dispute over water in the
Cauvery Basin in India

25. Frequent droughts in Somalia put significant pressures on pastoral
livelihoods. Droughts cause herders to sell more of their livestock
than they would under normal conditions, resulting in
plummeting livestock prices and deteriorating rural incomes.
Widespread poverty and lack of economic alternatives, in turn,
provide incentives for illicit activities and for joining armed groups
such as Al Shabaab, which offer cash revenues and other benefits
to their fighters. Especially the record drought of 2011 is believed
to have swelled the ranks of the militant Islamist group.
7. Droughts, livestock prices and
armed conflict in Somalia

26. The Turkish-Armenian case is a prominent
example of how two coriparians can put
their tensions aside, work together in
their mutual interest, and share
transboundary waters equitably.
8. Turkey-Armenia: Water cooperation despite tensions

27. Egypt is currently using more water than its
internal renewable resources - mainly based
on Nile fresh water inflows - supply. Water
stress in Egypt is expected to further increase
in the future as a result of rapid population
growth, rising temperatures and increasing
water consumption. If not properly dealt with,
growing freshwater scarcity will put severe
strains on Egypt’s economy and make the
country more vulnerable to renewed internal
strife. Moreover, it risks putting increasing
pressure on Egypt’s diplomatic relations with
other states along the Nile.
9. Security implications of growing water scarcity in Egypt

28. In 2000, privatisation of the drinking water in
Cochabamba incurred violent protests and escalated
into the so-called ‘Water War of Cochabamba’,
which killed at least nine people. Eventually, the
city’s water was renationalised and access to water
received new legal backing. However, dwindling
water supplies induced by global climate change,
over-consumption and technological deficiencies
continue to heavily strain the city of Cochabamba.
10. Water privatisation in Cochabamba, Bolivia