Viet Nam Human Rights
Asia Pacific shows progress in water security, but challenges remain
5/9/16
Water security in Asia and Pacific has progressed overall in the
past 5 years, but major challenges remain, including overexploited groundwater,
demand from rising populations, and climate variability, according to a new
report from ADB.
The
new edition of the Asian Water Development Outlook (AWDO 2016) released on
August 30th 2016 at World Water Week in Stockholm provides a snapshot of the
water security status of 48 of the region’s countries, using latest data sets.
According to these, the number of countries assessed as water insecure has
dropped to 29, compared to 38 (out of 49 countries) identified in the previous
issue of the report in 2013.
“Asia
and Pacific remains the world’s most vulnerable region to water insecurity and
cannot sustain its recent economic growth without addressing this issue,” said
ADB Vice-President for Knowledge Management and Sustainable Development Bambang
Susantono, who led the launch in Stockholm. “Meeting the region’s socioeconomic
challenges and achieving Sustainable Development Goal 6 on water will require
bridging the gap in provision of water services between rich and poor in urban
areas, and between rural and urban areas.”
The
report cites that in Asia and the Pacific, 1.7 billion people lack access to
basic sanitation. Recent estimates suggest that by 2050, 3.4 billion people
could be living in water-stressed areas in Asia and the Pacific while water
demand will increase by 55%.
AWDO
2016 assesses water security in 5 key dimensions—namely household access,
economic viability, urban services, restoring rivers and ecosystems, and
resilience to water-related disasters.
Advanced
economies such as Australia, Japan and New Zealand consistently lead the way,
followed by countries in East Asia—led by the People’s Republic of China (PRC),
which has taken the biggest stride to improve water security since the AWDO
2013 edition.
On
household access to piped potable water and improved sanitation, the water
security score in Asia and the Pacific on a 20-point scale ranges from 4.5 for
South Asia to 20.0 for the advanced economies. All parts of the region improved
their performance by about 2 points since 2013, except for the Pacific islands.
But although the rural-urban gap has been reduced in some countries (such as
Armenia and Thailand), the report says major disparities remain between rural
and urban areas and between rich and poor on services and infrastructure for
piped water supply and sanitation. South Asian countries particularly need to
make considerable efforts to improve their performance in this dimension.
The
second key dimension, economic water security, provides an assessment of the
productive use of water to sustain economic growth in food production, industry
and energy.
Most
of the change since 2013 has been positive with advanced countries again
showing the highest scores and Pacific islands lagging. But there remains room
for improvement across the region. Countries that merit strengthening current
conditions are concentrated in Central Asia.
On
No. 3, urban water security, East Asia has shown positive progress while South
and Southeast Asia still have some way to go, particularly Myanmar, Pakistan,
and the Philippines.
Nearly
half of the economies have piped water supply levels higher than 85% but less
than 50% of the urban population have access to improved sanitation.
In
many areas, the majority of wastewater is discharged to the environment having
received little to no treatment. The report says significant investment and
leadership is needed to reliably meet the water needs of cities.
The
fourth key dimension describes how well a country is able to manage its river
basins and sustain ecosystem services. This shows a wide range of results, with
the Pacific islands scoring highly due to good river health and advanced
economies doing well due to strong governance.
Declining
river health is most evident in Bangladesh, the lower Yangtze River Basin of
the PRC, Nepal, and Mekong Delta in Viet Nam, the report says.
For
the fifth key dimension, resilience to water-related disasters, advanced
economies show the strongest performance while much of the rest of Asia and the
Pacific has been weak.
Between
1995 and 2015, there were some 2,495 water-related disasters striking Asia,
killing 332,000 people and affecting a further 3.7 billion. South Asia showed
the lowest resilience score, but several other countries showed strong
improvement since 2013. These included Pakistan; the Philippines; and
Taipei,China.
The
report concludes that the relationship between water security and the economy
can be a virtuous—or a vicious—circle. “There is a strong relationship between
water management and the economy, and investments in good water management can
be considered as a longer term payback for increased growth and poverty
reduction,” the publication says. “Water-related investments can increase
economic productivity and growth, while economic growth provides the resources
to invest in institutions and capital-intensive water infrastructure.”
AWDO
2016 is produced by ADB in partnership with the Asia Pacific Water Forum and
three specialist agencies—Asia Pacific Center for Water Security at Tsinghua
University, International Water Management Institute, and International Water
Centre. Key contributions have also been made by the International Institute
for Applied Systems Analysis./.
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All comments [ 10 ]
When considering global water security, it is important to keep in mind that not all countries can economically or politically tackle all of the solutions.
Many either new or newly-modernizing countries – which we will refer to as “developing” – lack the financial capital necessary to implement these solutions, so we must analyze how they can still solve the problems that they face.
Developing countries often young politically, meaning they are just starting out, so there is often poor or nonexistent government regulation of water. However, as a developing country, a political window exists through which new solutions and new regulations can be implemented.
Long before the advent of modern medical care, industrialized countries decreased their levels of water-related disease through good water management. Yet, even in these countries, outbreaks of water-borne disease continue to occur, sometimes with lethal consequences.
Water contributes much to health. Good health is the essence of development.
water's protective role is largely unseen and taken for granted in the wealthier countries. More attention is paid to it's role in disease transmission than health protection.
The treatment of wastewater often is a haphazard affair. In developing regions of the world, treatment is applied in only a minority of systems. Even in the industrialized countries of North America and Europe, for example, sewage is not universally treated.
In a smaller proportion, people in industrialized countries also get sick from contaminated water and untreated sewage.
Managing water supply can be difficult in rural areas.
We could not live without water so let's save our resource for our future ganerations!
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