RIYADH, 7 June 2007 — Pointing out that water management practices in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region are still inadequate, the World Bank foresees a full-blown crisis that could see the per capita water availability halved by 2050, with serious consequences for the region’s already depleted aquifers and natural hydrological systems.
This is a major finding of the World Bank’s Regional Development Report with its focus on water resources. The results of the study were released at a seminar held at the Institute of Public Administration in Riyadh. Dr. Vijay Jagannathan, sector manager for water in MENA, presented the report.
The report points out that unless the use of water is reduced and water service providers are made accountable for their operations, drinking water services will become more erratic than they are already, cities will come to rely more and more on expensive desalination and during droughts will have to rely frequently on emergency supplies brought by water tankers.
The report said the impact of the situation is already being felt by farmers whose income has dropped in the wake of the depletion of aquifers.
“All of this will have short- and long-term effects on economic growth and poverty, will exacerbate social tensions within and between communities, and will put increasing pressure on public budgets,” said Jagannathan.
The report suggests decentralizing responsibility for delivering water services to financially autonomous utilities and stronger enforcement of environmental regulations.
These changes, the report said, should help governments make the transition from a focus on supply augmentation and direct service provision to a concentration on water management and regulation of services.
“To implement the new policies, most governments established ministries that manage water resources and staffed them with well-trained and dedicated professionals,” said Jagannathan. “Yet, these efforts have not led to the expected improvements in water outcomes. Resource management remains a problem in most MENA countries.”
Jagannathan added that water is still allocated to low-value uses even as higher-value needs remain unfulfilled. Water service outages are common, as most Riyadh residents can attest, even in years of normal rainfall. People and economies remain vulnerable to droughts and floods; over-extraction of groundwater is undermining national assets at rates equivalent to 1 to 2 percent of GDP every year in some countries, while environmental problems related to water cost between 0.5 and 2.5 percent of GDP every year, the World Bank states.
According to the report, many countries have not yet tackled some of the most important reforms because they have proved politically sensitive. The reasons vary with the context in each country, but, in most cases, politically important groups have opposed the changes.
Certain powerful groups benefit from subsidized services or existing allocations of water and want to maintain the status quo.
