Global Experts Unite to Study Water Shortages

[maddezmom]

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - By 2025, a third of the world's population will be facing acute water shortages and farmers, academics and governments must work together to solve the problem, global experts said on Thursday.



Seventy percent of global water usage is taken up by agriculture and using water efficiently is seen as key in preventing serious shortages, with experts studying river basins across the world for clues to boost food production.


"We need to find ways of using water more efficiently so as to produce more food using the same water or even less," Jonathon Woolley, co-ordinator for the Sri Lanka based Challenge Program on Water and Food, which is funded by international donors and the World Bank (news - web sites), told a Johannesburg news conference.


In southern Africa, academics from Botswana, South Africa, Mozambique and Zimbabwe are studying ways of using water more effectively in the Limpopo river basin, where inefficient subsistence agriculture leaves many reliant on food aid.



more: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=570&ncid=753&e=9&u=/nm/20041118/sc_nm/environment_water_dc

[maddezmom]

1. self serving kick

:(

[DireStrike]

2. Hrm. What causes this? Pop. Growth?

Man, if this is just regular growth... peak oil is gonna suck.

[Lorien]

4. For the most part, yes.

there aren't many governments on earth that will bring up the subject of zero population growth, since in part population growth is tied to economic growth.

I read somewhere that one of the reasons for the Iraq war was to secure their water resources (for Israel, presumably). Does anyone remember anything about this?

[meganmonkey]

3. Those damn activist scientists, trying to interfere again

just like they do with global warming.

Privatize, privatize, privatize, I always say!

:eyes:

[Zorra]

5. Have no fear, Bu$h has a faith based solution to this problem.

Armageddon.

DU Progressive Living And Economic Activism Forum:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=255

[Kenneth ken]

6. meanwhile,

corporations, like Nestle, are buying up all the water - which should be a commons item - since every living thing on the planet needs it for survival - and bottling it to sell to those who can afford it.

Soon enough, your 'right to life' will be completely dependent on the amount of money you have, unless we regain control over corporations. The only way to rein them in is by boycott.

link to Nestle bottled water page

snip from the page:

In April 2002, the Group changed its name to Nestlé Waters, a token of Nestlé's decisive commitment to the bottled water market, which now represents 9% of its sales. Today, Nestlé Waters is established in 130 countries and markets about 70 different brands. The Group is able to offer top quality brands and innovative packaging to meet the individual needs of the water consumer all over the world, whenever, wherever and however thanks to the wide variety of its offer in terms of distribution and product mix.

[George_S]

7. It's the water, stupid.

The scorching sun beats relentlessly on one of Latin America's most desolate zones. It is here in the northern province of Chaco, directly above the GuaranI aquifer, the largest resource of fresh drinking water in the world, where Moon's associates claim he wishes to build an ecological paradise.

Nevertheless, national Senator Domingo Laino sees a different pattern in Moon's acquisitions. "There are two principal branches to Moon's interest in Paraguay," he said, "control of the largest fresh drinking water source in the world and control of the narcotics business", which is so prevalent in this area. "President Lula told me that Brazil took serious measures to curb Moon a few years back as it became evident that he was buying up the border between our two countries," said the senator.

Allegations from local law enforcement officials support this claim. The so-called Dr Montiel, Paraguay's drugs tsar from 1976-89, said: "The fact that they came and bought in Chaco and on both sides of the Brazilian border is very telling. It is an enormously strategic point in both the narcotics and arms trades and indeed the available intelligence clearly shows that the Moon sect is involved in both these enterprises."

http://www.religionnewsblog.com/8997-.html