If there is an area where we feel the most the impact of climate change, it’s water. In a warming world, the fight for water can push nations apart, as the fragile hydropolitical balance is disrupted by scarcity.
Clashes over water have always existed in modern times, but increasing freshwater scarcity is speeding up the phenomenon. Recorded events of conflicts have increased in the last 20 years, as a downpour of water struggles is shaping our present.
283
water conflicts in the last decade
Source: Pacific Institute, October 2018
No. of Conflicts
The registered conflicts of the last decade all share one common driver: the location of water resources. As lakes, rivers and aquifers are oblivious to borders, the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) has addressed through its Transboundary Water Assessment Program the ability of these shared water resources to sustain the ecosystem services for human wellbeing.
According to UNEP, there is a tendency for risk to increase ‘downstream’, with the exception of transboundary governance arrangements for aquifers, which are largely absent.
Wherever governance and socioeconomic risk touch medium values, conflicts are more likely to explode.
Click on the areas to display the risk on water resources. Hover on the circles to see the related country's number of conflicts.
Sources: Pacific Institute, UNEP/GEF, October 2018
The politics of border water are fragile. Governments come and go, and the slightest change in nations’ leadership can topple the feeble balance reached. Many a government is unprepared for future water shortages: as reported by the Stimson Center, Pakistan can only store about 30 days worth of water - thoroughly inadequate in a warming world.
Despite the water crisis, no modern nation has ever declared war on another solely over water. In fact, transboundary organisations have prevented many a fight. Notwithstanding, local water competition results in conflictive events in the majority of cases.
The graph shows the hydropolitical situation of the countries affected by water clashes, divided in geographical macro-areas. Use the slider to scroll over the map frame.
According to CNA, lack of water is a key factor in encouraging terrorist organisations to use water control as a weapon. Violent water disputes between neighbouring tribes, farmers and herders characterise many Sub-Saharan nations, while water related problems have spurred affected communities worldwide to protest, to which some governments have responded by using coercive force. Overall the role of infrastructures, firstly dams, in water clashes is undermining.
Trigger
Water as a trigger or root cause of conflict, where there is a dispute over the control of water or water systems or where economic or physical access to water, or scarcity of water, triggers violence.
Casualty
Water resources or water systems as a casualty of conflict, where water resources, or water systems, are intentional or incidental casualties or targets of violence.
Weapon
Water as a weapon of conflict, where water resources, or water systems themselves, are used as a tool or weapon in a violent conflict.
Source: Pacific Institute, October 2018
Dams are built to increase water efficiency. However, the increasing reuse and recirculation of water, in itself a response to water scarcity, results in the deterioration of water quality. According to the latest FAO Water Report, all causes of water scarcity are related to human interference with the water cycle - resulting in an increase of extreme weather events. If there is a connection between bad water management, water stress and conflicts, on the other hand the effect of extreme weather is more indirect, though not to be underestimated.
The graphs represent the distribution of the analysed countries based on their total number of conflicts in relation with extreme weather events and water consumption issues. Values on the y axis have been normalised to 5 in order to compare the trends.
Toggle the tabs to choose the metre of comparison.
Source: AQUASTAT, October 2018
Source: AQUASTAT, October 2018
The World Economic Forum has asserted that freshwater shortage will lead to the next global crisis. “Future water conflicts may arise mostly in places where countries have plans for dams but have yet to bother talking to their downstream neighbours”, affirms Aaron Wolf, eminent scholar of water controversies. Hydropolitics have been boiling up indeed; skirmishes have increased on a local scale, but on the other hand transboundary disputes rarely result in open war, as international cooperation still prevents the rise of conflict.
If climate change is indeed a threat to water resources and a catalyst for conflicts, on the other hand hydropolitics are a complex issue which also accounts many other socioeconomic variables, that need to be addressed nonetheless.
