OECD-backed group requires international pact to resolve water crisis

storyp1> SINGAPORE, Oct 17 (Reuters) Countries require a new global pact to repair an installing water crisis that could cut economic development by a minimum of 8% and put half the world's food supplies at threat by 2050, an OECDbacked commission said on Thursday.

Climate modification, devastating land use and chronic mismanagement has put the international water cycle under unmatched tension, stated the Global Commission on the Economics of Water (GCEW), a two-year research initiative set up by the Netherlands in 2022.

Densely populated areas like northwestern India, northeastern China and southern and eastern Europe are especially vulnerable to water scarcities, it stated.

Federal governments should collaborate to create incentives to transform how water is consumed and ensure that investment in vital infrastructure reaches the ideal places, GCEW stated in its final report.

We are going to need to set common goals for water sustainability, said Singapore President Tharman Shanmugaratnam, GCEW co-chair.

Ultimately, it will need a worldwide water pact. It is going to take a number of years to arrive, but we are going to begin that procedure, he said at a briefing ahead of the report's launch.

The report stated international water products can no longer be depended on, partially as a result of shifting rainfall patterns, with each 1 degree Celsius of warming estimated to increase atmospheric moisture retention by 7%.

For the very first time, we are really changing the really source of all freshwater - specifically rainfall, stated Johan Rockstrom, director of the Potsdam Institute for Environment Impact Research study and another commission co-chair.

As well as blue water in rivers and lakes, the commission took a look at green water included in soils and plant life. After evaporating, green water provides around half of global rains in a process known as atmospheric rivers.

Rising temperatures have actually developed a vicious circle, with lower soil moisture intensifying droughts and wildfires and causing more destruction and biodiversity loss, more disrupting those climatic river streams, the commission stated.

Regions relying on high levels of irrigation might struggle with water storage capacity declines. On existing patterns, worldwide cereal production might fall by as much 23%.

Financing systems are needed to motivate financial investment in water infrastructure, especially in more vulnerable countries, and banks need to likewise make lending conditional on protecting water products, the report said.

International efforts are also required to price water correctly and redeploy an approximated $600 billion in annual farming aids that encourage overconsumption and the planting of water-intensive crops in unsuitable regions, stated Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Director General of the World Trade Organization and another GCEW co-chair.

While multilateral cooperation is required to attend to dangers to worldwide water products, growing lacks could exacerbate geopolitical stress, stated Genevieve Donnellon-May, a scientist at the Oxford Global Society think tank, who studies water politics.

One concern is that growing water deficiency could result in less transboundary cooperation, both at a subnational level ... and also between countries, she said.

(source: Reuters)