Transboundary supply issues

Water politics•Water is a strategic resource for many countries…•Water could become a tradable commodity, bringing benefits to water-rich nations (Greenland, Canada, Colombia).•Annual profits of global water industry are around 40% of oil industry.•Suez, Veolia/Vivendi, Bechtel-United have almost 400million customers in 140 countries.

Water politics

• Where water resources cross international boundaries, the challenges for integrated watershed management are made more complex and political co-operation compromised.

• Authorities responsible for sources and upstream tributaries are able to control downstream flows, possibly depriving other states of the resource.

Water politics• There are 261 international rivers covering 45% of the earth’s land surface.• 19 basins are shared by five or more riparian countries.

Examples inlude: Danube Rhine Congo Niger ZambeziLake Chad Nile Okavango BasinAmazon Ganges/Brahmaputra Indus MekongColorado Jordan Tigris/Euphrates

• Read about international rivers and geopolitics/hydropolitics p 43-47 Pearson sheet

Nilehttp://www.mg.co.za/article/2005-03-17-risk-of-armed-conflict-over-nile-water

The Blue and White Nile provide Egypt with vital water supplies, but 85% come from other countries.

All the following are in the Nile basin:BurundiD.R.CongoEgyptEritreaEthiopiaKenyaRwandaSudanTanzaniaUganda

All have rising population and want to irrigate their agriculture to help feed the population and develop

Evidence of more effective co-operation• The Nile Basin Initiative, system of cooperative

management which started late 1990s• All countries except Eritrea working with The

World Bank and bi-lateral aid donors .• Community level involvement .• Managers visited Colorado River recently to see

how effectively the 1922 River Water Compact and its ‘law of the river’ works

Hydropolitics and geopolitics

•The Nile is the world’s longest river , 6,500kms, 2.9km2 catchment,10% of Africa, running through 10 countries with 360 million people depending on it for survival.•Growing issues of desertification & salination and increased evaporation linked to climate change•About 85 % water originates from Eritrea and Ethiopia, but 94 % is used by Sudan and Egypt.

• 1996 Helsinki Rules on the Uses of the Waters of International Rivers - regulating how transboundary rivers and groundwater are managed

• The Nile Basin is an example that ‘Water Wars’ may be averted

History of hydropolitics in Nile Basin•tensions due to the dominance of Egypt• civil wars in Sudan Ethiopia • tensions from Egypt’s treaties dating back to the 1929 and 1959 Nile Water Agreements.• Upstream states increasingly challenging Egypt’s dominance.•Ethiopia wants to use the Nile River for HEP plants and industrial development.

Tech Fix ;The megaprojects of dams

like Aswan are famous. Latest high tech is the 1990sproject called

‘Tecconile’ a joint GIS system to help monitor and

plan the basin

Political negotiations centred on conflicts over the shared use of water sources

Oxford 76-79

• Write notes!

India, Bangladesh and China

India and China

The Brahmaputra could be diverted to ease water supplies in Southern China = scarcity in India

Bangladesh and IndiaGanges1974 India opened the Farakka Barrage 11km from boarderTakes water to major Indian cities and polluted water goes into it, which effects Bangladesh

BrahmaputraIndia now plans to use this.Impact on Bangladesh is fish stocks decline / lack of water for irrigation and food production / increased salinisation / delta is eroded and less silt being deposited

Indian Dams on the Indus

These 4 dams will cut of irrigation to farms in Pakistan

Recap – what case studies could you use to answer these?

• ‘Referring to examples, assess the potential for water conflict in areas where demand exceeds supply’ (15)

• Referring to examples, explain why future water supplies for many regions are increasingly insecure (15)

HW 1. Plan an answer to these questions based on themes /

ideas not case studies2. Produce an annotated A3 world map of water hotspots