Under pressure from overconsumption and climate change, water scarcity “tends to spread,” posing an “imminent risk” of a global water crisis, the UN report released Tuesday warns.
Water scarcity, lack of drinking water, increasing droughts and floods… Billions of people are already affected by water problems, with an “imminent” risk of a global crisis, the United Nations organization warns in a report released on Tuesday.
Around two billion people lack access to safe drinking water and 3.6 billion lack access to safely managed sanitation, underscores the report by UN-Water and Unesco, hours before the opening of a rare UN conference on water in New York.
More than 100,000 dead in 20 years
About 10% of the world’s population lives in a country where water scarcity is at high or critical levels, which “significantly” limits the availability of water for people’s needs.
And according to the UN climate change experts (IPCC) report released on Monday, “around half of the world’s population” suffers from “severe” water shortages for at least part of the year.
With global warming, the humidity in the atmosphere increases by about 7% for each additional degree, resulting in more, more intense and less regular precipitation.
According to the report, between 2000 and 2019, flooding caused an estimated $650 billion in damage, affected 1.65 million people and caused more than 100,000 deaths.
Minimum $1,000,000,000 required
Global warming also multiplies droughts, which affected 1.43 million people and caused $130 billion in damage over the same period. Together, droughts and floods account for more than 75% of humankind’s natural disasters.
Estimates are difficult, but a study cited in the report puts the investment at more than $1 trillion a year to achieve the UN’s sixth Sustainable Development Goal, water and sanitation for all, by 2030.
In particular, to ensure universal and equitable access to a drinking water supply by 2030, current investments would have to be tripled.