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Jordan valley withers in wilderness of Mideast politics
The Ein Gedi spa, built 40 years ago on the shore of the Dead Sea -- the lowest point on Earth -- now offers a tractor shuttle to carry bathers across the kilometre (more than half a mile) of salt flats that separate it from the water's edge.
A few kilometres (a couple of miles) up the shore, a campsite that used to rent out cabins by the sea has been sucked underground by the opening of cavernous sinkholes, some more than 30 metres (yards) wide.
The first one burst open in 1998, swallowing a cabin and a cleaning woman.
"The earth swallowed her up. She fell nearly 10 metres. They made everyone leave that day and closed the camp down," says Gundi Shahal, an Israeli environmentalist who came to Ein Gedi from Germany in 1979.
"Since then it hasn't stopped. The whole campground looks like a moonscape," she says as she walks past the massive holes, one of which contains the rusted shell of a car.
Across the street are rows of dead trees, the remains of a date plantation that was closed because of the danger of the sinkholes.
Scientists have documented some 2,500 such holes, with an average of 300 new ones opening up each year.
As the Dead Sea shrinks, the level of groundwater drops and as it retreats under the surface it dissolves layers of salt, creating underground caverns that eventually collapse into the sinkholes.
The Dead Sea derives most of its water from the Jordan river, which over the past 50 years has virtually disappeared as a result of massive upstream water projects in Israel, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan.
For Mohammed Saida, a farmer in the Palestinian village of Al-Auja some 40 kilometres (25 miles) north of Ein Gedi, the Jordan river vanished completely when Israel fenced it off after seizing the West Bank in the 1967 Six Day War.
The land his family once owned along the river is now in a closed military zone and they have to rely on village wells and a seasonal underground spring.
During the winter, the spring spouts up to 2,000 cubic metres (70,000 cubic feet) of water a day but in the summer and early autumn it is reduced to a squalid puddle.
"This valley floods every year, but we have no dams so it all goes into the Jordan," Saida says. Israel restricts the building of dams and drilling of wells by Palestinians in the West Bank.
At the foot of the valley sits a water pump freshly painted blue and white like the Israeli flag. Inside an engine pumps water for Israeli settlers and Al-Auja residents.
Per capita water consumption in the West Bank stands at 50 litres (around 13 gallons) a day, according to a World Bank report published this month, about two-thirds less than the target recommended by the World Health Organisation.
Israel uses around 83 percent of the water originating in the occupied territory, with the rest going to the Palestinians, whose annual water extraction has dropped by around 10 percent in the past decade, according to the same report.
"(The Israelis) took the entire river, their share and ours, they took the land, and now they are drilling wells to take our water," says Hussein Saida, Mohammed's cousin and a village councillor. "How can there be peace?"
Shahal and the Saidas belong to Friends of the Earth Middle East (FOEME), a group of environmentalists from Israel, Jordan, and the West Bank.
They have long lobbied for a project to rejuvenate the Jordan valley and the Dead Sea by using desalinated water from the Mediterranean to meet upstream demands.
But the idea getting the most attention, and dividing scientists and environmentalists, is the proposed construction of a massive canal between the Red Sea and the Dead Sea. The Ein Gedi spa, built 40 years ago on the shore of the Dead Sea -- the lowest point on Earth -- now offers a tractor shuttle to carr... more -
The world has a water shortage, not a food shortage
Most people may drink only two litres of water a day, but they consume about 3,000 if the water that goes into their food is taken into account. The rich gulp down far more, since they tend to eat more meat, which takes far more water to produce than grains. So as the world's population grows and incomes rise, farmers will if they use today's methods need a great deal more water to keep everyone fed: 2,000 more cubic kilometres a year by 2030, according to the International Water Management Institute (IWMI), a research centre, or over a quarter more than they use today. Yet in many farming regions, water is scarce and likely to get scarcer as global warming worsens. The world is facing not so much a food crisis as a water crisis, argues Colin Chartres, IWMI's director-general.
The solution, Mr Chartres and others contend, is more efficient use of water or, as the sloganeers put it,; more crop per drop;. Some 1.2 billion people, about a fifth of the world's population, live in places that are short of water (see map). Farming accounts for roughly 70% of human water consumption. So when water starts to run out, as is happening in northern China, southern Spain and the western United States, among other places, farming tends to offer the best potential for thrift. But governments, whether to win votes or to protect the poor, rarely charge farmers a market price for water. So they are usually more wasteful than other consumers even though the value they create from the water is often less than households or industry would be willing to pay for it.
The pressing need is to make water go further. Antoine Frarot, the head of the water division of Veolia Environnement, a French firm, promotes recycling, whereby city wastewater is treated until it can be used in industry or agriculture. This costs about a third less than desalination, and cuts pollution. He expects his recycling business to quadruple in the next decade. Yet as Mr Frarot himself concedes, there are many even cheaper ways to save water. As much as 70% of water used by farmers never gets to crops, perhaps lost through leaky irrigation channels or by draining into rivers or groundwater. Investment in drip irrigation, or simply repairing the worst leaks, could bring huge savings.
end of excerpt.
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I believe that irrigation holds the solution to a great part of the global water crisis. In many parts of the world sprinkler irrigation is still the most used method of irrigation because it is the most available and least expensive. This method however is very wasteful, and using it in places where pervasive drought is common is not cost effective. In order for us as a species to mitigate the crisis we will surely face regarding water if present behavior persists we will have to change how we do things. Regarding the irrigation of crops it will be how they are irrigated, when they are irrigated based on changing weather patterns, and also in focusing on areas looking towards less water intensive crops in drier areas.
It is unfortunate that the very places where the most water intensive crops are grown such as cotton, rice, and corn (India, China, Africa, and the Southwest US ) are experiencing the most pervasive droughts and desertification now. As population increases towards 9 billion and resources become scarcer, farmers will most certainly have to devise ways of conserving water to get optimal growth and yield from a limited resource.
Through shifting the emphasis on crop varieties grown in these areas if possible and by changing irrigation methods from sprinkler to drip irrigation, trillions of gallons of water could be saved. Also in places where weather patterns are changing and are seeing more rain, rain catchement systems will be invaluable in helping to catch excess rain and use it for irrigation purposes.
more at the link. Most people may drink only two litres of water a day, but they consume about 3,000 if the water that goes into their food is taken int... more -
Facing The Freshwater Crisis
From Scientific American:
Key points:
Global freshwater resources are threatened by rising demands from many quarters.
Growing populations need ever more water for drinking, hygiene, sanitation, food production and industry.
Climate change, meanwhile, is expected to contribute to droughts.
Policymakers need to figure out how to supply water without degrading the natural ecosystems that provide it.
Existing low-tech approaches can help prevent scarcity, as can ways to boost supplies, such as improved methods to desalinate water.
But governments at all levels need to start setting policies and making investments in infrastructure for water conservation now.
A friend of mine lives in a middle-class neighborhood of New Delhi, one of the richest cities in India. Although the area gets a fair amount of rain every year, he wakes in the morning to the blare of a megaphone announcing that freshwater will be available only for the next hour. He rushes to fill the bathtub and other receptacles to last the day. New Delhi’s endemic shortfalls occur largely because water managers decided some years back to divert large amounts from upstream rivers and reservoirs to irrigate crops.
My son, who lives in arid Phoenix, arises to the low, schussing sounds of sprinklers watering verdant suburban lawns and golf courses. Although Phoenix sits amid the Sonoran Desert, he enjoys a virtually unlimited water supply. Politicians there have allowed irrigation water to be shifted away from farming operations to cities and suburbs, while permitting recycled wastewater to be employed for landscaping and other nonpotable applications.
As in New Delhi and Phoenix, policymakers worldwide wield great power over how water resources are managed. Wise use of such power will become increasingly important as the years go by because the world’s demand for freshwater is currently overtaking its ready supply in many places, and this situation shows no sign of abating. That the problem is well-known makes it no less disturbing: today one out of six people, more than a billion, suffer inadequate access to safe freshwater. By 2025, according to data released by the United Nations, the freshwater resources of more than half the countries across the globe will undergo either stress—for example, when people increasingly demand more water than is available or safe for use—or outright shortages. By midcentury as much as three quarters of the earth’s population could face scarcities of freshwater.
Scientists expect water scarcity to become more common in large part because the world’s population is rising and many people are getting richer (thus expanding demand) and because global climate change is exacerbating aridity and reducing supply in many regions. What is more, many water sources are threatened by faulty waste disposal, releases of industrial pollutants, fertilizer runoff and coastal influxes of saltwater into aquifers as groundwater is depleted. Because lack of access to water can lead to starvation, disease, political instability and even armed conflict, failure to take action can have broad and grave consequences.
end of excerpt.
My comments at the link. From Scientific American: Key points: Global freshwater resources are threatened by rising demands from many quarters. ... more -
To Neglect Water...Is To Give It to Multi nationals
Serious and extremely worrying evidence indicates that water supplies are steadily being used up. And the causes of water scarcity are much the same as those of the food crisis: demand exceeds a finite supply.
The world's population is projected to grow from 6 billion to 8.5 billion by 2030 and unless we change the way we use water and increase water productivity — ie. produce more 'crop per drop' — we will not be able to feed them. That is the conclusion of the IWMI's recent Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture and its book, Water for Food, Water for Life, which drew on the work of 700 scientists.
end of excerpt.
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In all of the time I have been posting to this blog on the subject of water scarcity, this message has been the priority. Investing in water infrastructure and educating people in developing countries regarding irrigation methods that save water as well as planting conventional crop varieties that are not as water intensive. However, even though these are the main goals one of the priorities here as well that was also not mentioned in this article is stopping the commoditization and corporatization of water that keeps it from being used by the people as the human right it is.
I have been reporting recently on Current.com (linked here in the column) about Monsanto and its plan to spread GM foods across the globe. Foods which biotech makeup has been linked to possible health effects not only in humans but in cows through Posilac (Bovine growth hormones) in milk, and the environmental affects on waterways through the use of Roundup Herbicides. It is an insidious plan wherein they are buying up seed companies globally and binding farmers to only plant seeds in one season without permission to replant next season unless they continue to buy seed from Monsanto at a huge profit to the company. Monsanto has even gone so far as to 'patent' seed and pursue litigation against farmers they accuse of replanting seeds (as has been done in agriculture from its inception centuries ago) and even harrassing farmers who are innocent due to pollen from other fields landing on their crops. They are also lobbying state legislatures to not label foods that contain bovine hormones and GM ingredients.
But not only is Monsanto in the business of monopolizing seeds of the world and taking away the consumer's right to know, they are also involved in pursuing the privitization of water. Currently they have such projects in India and Mexico which will bring them millions in revenues.They are cornering the market on food and water in developing countries and in the US and by their methods putting farmers in great debt to the point that they are committing suicide in India due to BT cotton.
Therefore, while other explanations for food and water shortages certainly are relevant and deserving of our utmost attention, stopping multi nationals as well from patenting and stealing life is also one of the most important and crucial environmental and moral fights we will have in this century. For whoever controls the food and water controls the world.
So again, we do have enough food and water to feed and sustain the world if we start now to work on plans for the future that conserve these resources and address overpopulation. We don't need The World Bank to continue to scaremonger about this for profit. We don't need Monsantos to take advantage of us for profit. We need a plan that actually educates people about conservation and effective irrigation and infrastructure, and we need to give farming back to the farmers and water back to the people. Serious and extremely worrying evidence indicates that water supplies are steadily being used up. And the causes of water scarcity are... more -
What's your water footprint?
Water conservation can begin with your dinner plate. Sure, it looks like merely a hamburger with cheese, a baked potato and a cup of coffee.
But look at it in terms of water: ● It took about 464 gallons of water to produce that quarter pound of beef, ● 108 gallons to produce a potato, ● 37 gallons to make 1 ounce of cheese ● and 37 gallons of water to create your 8-ounce cup of coffee.
This concept of calculating how much water goes into the production of food or other items is called "virtual water." Instead of seeing only the item in front of you — say, a ribeye steak — you look at where it came from, how the cattle was raised, how many gallons of water were used in irrigation to produce the feed the cattle ate, how many gallons of water were used to create the fertilizer and pesticides used in raising the feed corn, how much water was consumed by the actual animal, how many resources went into getting that animal from the ranch to the slaughter house to the packing plant to the store to you.
As food and energy costs continue to rise, and concern about the effects of global warming increases, many consumers are looking at choices differently. Our community consolidates car trips to save gas and plans meals based on coupons and sales instead of convenience.
Water is a prized resource in our part of the world and we face huge policy questions as communities in Arizona continue to grow in size and population. We must come to terms with how we use this priceless and limited commodity.
snip
"I think people at the global level are talking about this with global trading in food, but it's only now becoming a local issue," said Pat Gober, the co-director of the Decision Center for a Desert City at Arizona State University. "If somebody in Phoenix consumes a hamburger it's not consuming much of Phoenix's water, but it's consuming Brazil's water, or wherever the beef was raised. It's the globalization of our food supply.
"Food as a way of conserving water," said Gober. "I think it's an important thing to think about."
How much water do you really use?
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When adding up all of the water you use in just one day to shower, drink, cook, clean, eat, prepare food, and for sanitation, not to mention recreation, pools, sprinklers, watering lawns, washing cars, washing clothes, etc., it is astounding to see the total. And the impacts of that use are felt globally.
http://www.waterfootprint.org can help you calculate your water footprint and give you information about how to bring it down. It is only when we begin to look beyond the dinner plate and the tangible items to see what goes into them that we become more aware and more enpowered in our choices. And that can have a positive global effect, especially now as not only 45 % of our country is in some stage of drought, but much of our world. Water conservation can begin with your dinner plate. Sure, it looks like merely a hamburger with cheese, a baked potato and a cup of c... more -
Study:Growing More Rice With Less Water
The rice intensification method saves water, increases food production, and does not emit methane. These are the types of solutions we need to look for in this year to avoid a major global water crisis. And again, it will take a moral will on the part of people globally to use water more wisely in tune with more effective agricultural and irrigation methods to meet population demands. India, Asia, and Indonesia are the rice producers of the world experiencing the greatest effects of water scarcity which have also put their mainstay food source at tremendous risk. This is indeed a way to then offer hope and a balance to save lives./////excerpt:With a focus on India ? a country which faces a major water crisis, yet has the world?s largest rice cultivated area ? the study found that the system of rice intensification (SRI) method has helped increase yields by over 30% ? four to five tonnes per hectare instead of three tonnes per hectare, while using 40% less water than conventional methods./////The system is based on eight principles which are different to conventional rice cultivation. They include developing nutrient-rich and un-flooded nurseries instead of flooded ones; ensuring wider spacing between rice seedlings; preferring composts or manure to synthetic fertilizers; and managing water carefully to avoid that the plants? roots are not saturated./////The method was initially developed in the 1980s in Madagascar and has been demonstrated to be effective in 28 countries./////end of excerpt. The rice intensification method saves water, increases food production, and does not emit methane. These are the types of solutions we... more
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A Better Way To Water Your Lawn
With drought posing an ever increasing threat to potable water supplies, one of the first steps we can take is to stop over watering our landscape. This irrigation tutorial from a nationally certified lawn sprinkler system specialist helps to address this problem. With drought posing an ever increasing threat to potable water supplies, one of the first steps we can take is to stop over watering o... more
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Irrigation
