Water referred to as the elixir of life is fast disappearing. In Asia, which houses 40 million people or 40 percent of the worlds population the situation seems more grim.
The Asian Development Bank, which is celebrating World Water Week this week feels that a serious shift in the allocation and management of water resources is necessary for Asia’s sustainable development especially since Asia’s urban population is predicted to grow by 70 percent in the next 25 years and climate change is expected to reduce crop yields by 2.5–10 percent by 2020, putting 132 million people at risk of extreme hunger by 2050.
A report entitled ‘Asian Water Development Outlook 2007‘ released by the Bank, outlines the inherent interrelationships between water and other important development-related sectors, like energy, food, and the environment. The bank points out that the future of Asian countries will be determined not by developments in any one of these sectors but rather in the interactions among all of them. Developments in all of these sectors will affect water, and, in turn, water developments will affect all these sectors.
While the report stresses on urban water and wastewater management, in Asia, It notes that while the status of provision of clean and drinkable water continues to be a serious concern in many Asian urban centers, of even greater concern are inadequate wastewater management practices—collection, proper treatment, and safe disposal of wastewater.
As Prof. Asit Biswas an economist at the ADB points out “It is likely that if there will be a water crisis in the future, it will not come because of actual physical scarcity of water, as many predict at present, but because of continuing neglect of proper wastewater management practices. Continuation of the present trend will make available water sources increasingly more contaminated, and will make provision of clean water more and more expensive, as well as more complex and difficult to manage. As a result of this neglect, water bodies in and around urban centers which are often seriously contaminated, affecting the health of both people and ecosystems.
The report which is an independent analysis commissioned by ADB, suggests that solving urban drinkable water and wastewater problems will require strong political will, accelerating demand from civil society to solve these problems, adequate financial and managerial support, and intensive capacity-building efforts at all levels.
