JEDDAH, 24 March 2004 — A forum on water entitled “Water: Uncertain Liquid Asset” was held on Sunday. On the eve of World Water Day, it was hosted by German Consul General Dr. Stephan Keller and moderated by Arab News senior journalist Roger Harrison.
In his opening remarks, Harrison highlighted the challenges facing the Kingdom’s water supplies which arise from “a rapidly increasing population using an increasing volume of water from finite reserves, and at the other end of the process, the disposal of wastewater in a manner that it does not pollute the remaining reserves or the water cycle.”
Dr. Omar Aburizaiza, director, water research unit at King Abdul Aziz University, reviewed ways to meet demands for clean water in the Kingdom.
“The generally accepted way to meet the increase in demand is by building more desalination plants, but this is expensive and increases pollution in Saudi urban areas.”
Demand management, he thought, was an effective way of extending the life of reserves. “The most effective method to control demand is pricing which would lead to water conservation.”
Other elements — awareness and public education on water use — could act as supplementary forces to help conservation.
Dr. Adil Bushnak, chairman of the Bushnak Group of Industries, outlined the problems of water shortage in all aspects of our lives. “Rather than simply a threat, it represents opportunities not only in evolving technology, but also in developing financial and social habits. The water challenge will not be met just by discussion, but by changing habits — individually and collectively.”
He said that the first step to conservation is awareness. “Effective change relies on an integrated outlook; we know of the few liters we use but we need to be aware of the total picture,” he said.
Both Dr. Bushnak and Dr. Aburizaiza highlighted the enormous use of agricultural water in the Kingdom. Agricultural water use has risen some 1,200 percent since the 1970’s.
“If we conserve just 10 or 15 percent of the agricultural water, this will be enough to supply the municipal sector for 5 or 10 years. Any major changes should be oriented toward the agricultural sector,” said Dr. Aburizaiza.
“Saudi Arabia should never plan to produce all its food; it is not feasible,” Dr. Bushnak concurred. “We have to be ready to produce our food when we have to; the issue is to have an integrated policy and long-term strategy, not just water treatment and desalination plants.”
The panel agreed that the Kingdom has good aquifers. The problem is that no one knows for sure the quantity of water remaining in them. “We are currently using about 10 times the rate of recharge,” said Dr. Bushnak. “Monitoring was stopped 15 years ago and technology to establish levels has improved since the last survey 25 years ago.”
A surprise to some, water run-off into the sea or desert in the southwest of the Kingdom is enough to supply the agricultural needs of a population of up to 50 million. “That,” said Dr. Bushnak, “indicates that there are natural resources but we need to manage them.”
Dr. Nahed Taher, senior economist for the National Commercial Bank, spoke about the major challenges and risks of project financing in the Kingdom. According to Dr. Taher, the estimate of projects needing finance in Saudi Arabia by 2010 is believed to be some $105 billion. The estimate for water finance alone will reach $35 billion by 2020.
She said the annual incremental increase in corporate finance of only SR4 billion riyals ($1.06 billion), while the financing requirements for these major projects, in addition to corporate finance, is around SR56 billion ($14.9 billion) and suggested this huge financial gap as why local banks do not finance major water projects.
Regarding government financing, Dr. Taher believes that the government, with increasing debt, cannot afford to finance mega-projects in the Kingdom. Government financing, she said, has gone down from SR 14.2 billion in 1982 to SR2.4 billion recently, a drop from 28 to 18 percent. This,” she said, “is a result of demographic pressures and our high dependency on a non-diversified oil economy.”
In reply to a question concerning water pricing and the entry of Saudi Arabia into the WTO, Dr. Taher said Saudi Arabia could put special conditions on water if low-income citizens cannot pay the economic or structured price of water.
Jeddah is one of the most polluted cities on earth, said another questioner, and pollution causes expensive damage. Dr. Aburizaiza was optimistic about future reduction of the current bad pollution.
“Two waste water plants are being built. Their capacity is 500,000 cubic meters a day,” he said. The groundwater in the Jeddah area is just salty, so there is no threat to the aquifer. There is no groundwater for drinking, so although pollution is very bad, we should not worry too much about it. “What we should worry about is coastal pollution. I hope that the plants will reduce this significantly,” he said.
Dr. Stephan Keller, the German Consul General, wondered about financing water projects. “If the state and banks cannot finance all the water project, why can one not ask people to pay the real price for water consumed?”
Dr. Bushnak said that countries who need to change their tariffs most are often the slowest to do so. “Usually, when water is scarce, it becomes a more political issue, not the other way. The introduction of a tariff is the biggest political as well as economic and financial challenge,” he said.
He pointed out that those who are benefiting from low tariffs are those who can afford to pay more. Those who can afford to pay least are paying — from water tankers — some ten times what the citizen connected to the network is paying.
He proposed a minimum for maintenance of life per day free, quoting the UN figure of 40 liters. “After that everybody must pay — this way there is no excuse. It’s a simple tariff. Just pay the cost.” He added that this would not contribute to restoring the environment because of accumulated damage done over many years.
