It's all about water

There is famine in the land of plenty. In parts of Eastern Uganda, crops have failed and people are now starving. In Uganda, the main problem is related to low incomes, inefficient markets and weak food storage and distribution systems. Food supplies at a country level are still more than adequate: indeed, Uganda is a net exporter of food to neighbouring countries, especially to Kenya and, increasingly, to south Sudan.

Across the border in Kenya, however, the situation is worse: the Prime Minister recently estimated a likely maize deficit of up to 1 million tonnes (about 30% of Kenya's annual demand for its core staple). Why? In short, the major factor is shortage of water. The rivers around Mt Kenya are drying up. Lake Naivasha (always vulnerable) is shrinking fast as a result of low replenishment and, critically, abstraction for irrigation for the flower farms which now encircle the lake. The main Nairobi water source near Thika is at a historically low level. And in the North, rains have failed (see picture above).


About 10 years ago when I was based at Njombe in southern Tanzania, Ronnie Cox, a CDC stalwart, told me that in his opinion access to water would be the next big problem for Africa. Ronnie had spent many years in Southern Africa (in particular Zimbabwe, where annual rainfall is concentrated in a 4-5 month burst between November and March, and where dams and irrigation schemes were a sine qua non for commercial farmers). He found East Africa's dependence on rainfed agriculture astonishing - along with the apparent disregard for basic water management systems - in particular the lack of attention to enforcement of the prohibition on stream bed cultivation. He might also have observed the lack of simple water harvesting techniques: it is still unusual to find gutters and rain water storage tanks in most houses (though this simple rainwater conservation method is now on the increase, at least for middle and high-earning households).

Mind you, East Africa, for all its problems, is for the most part blessed with healthy annual rainfall. Here's an extract from a rather bleak article by Bob Williamson entitled Peak Water:-

When will "Peak Water" hit--or has it already peaked while going mostly unnoticed? Fossil water reserves built up in ancient underground aquifers will run dry, we are being told. In fifteen of some of the world's most populous nations, it is already underway. In the United States the vast Ogallala aquifer was being overexploited. Under the North China Plain and in Saudi Arabia, unsustainable depletion is well underway. Over-pumping of aquifers is happening in Iran, Israel and Jordan, India and Pakistan, Mexico, Morocco and Spain, Tunisia and Syria, in the Yemen and South Korea.

We must ask; when will the water refugees start to migrate? When will the citizens of the cities' toilets and showers run dry? Which water domino will fall first? Is this lifeblood supply of water to be stopped for agriculture and irrigation, allowing it to wilt and die? Will our tap be turned off for the industrial model we have built our economic lives around? Will we feed ourselves or the machines of industry? Lake Chad, once viewed by astronauts from space, no longer appears in their windows, shrinking some 95 percent since 1960. Will it one day need renaming just like the "Snows of Kilimanjaro" or the Glacier National Park in the United States will? The world is incurring not only an economic, but also a water deficit. This deficit unlike an economic one is unable to be resolved by increased productivity, longer working hours, or more capital investment; this is a global threat to sustainable GDP for the developed and developing industrial economies. The economic powerhouse of the largest and strongest is in trouble.

Not just the largest and strongest. As always, the economically weaker nations will almost certainly struggle more as a result of water resource depletion.

There's an interesting (and under-reported) meeting taking place at the moment among the 10 countries covered by the Nile Basin treaty. This treaty - which was drawn up by the British in 1929 - governs Nile water consumption in the region. For obvious reasons, it is of critical importance to Sudan and Egypt - the major consumers of water originating around Lake Victoria and the Ethiopian plateau - and for which the waters of the Nile are, in effect, the source of life. Essentially this Treaty requires member nations to gain approval from Egypt prior to the utilisation of sources of Nile waters - a condition which has come under fierce debate in recent years - especially by Kenya, hardly surprising in the context of Kenya's current shrinking water supply.

One thing's for sure: water is going to become a bigger and bigger issue on the world stage. In a way this is a good thing: our leaders will need to think more and devote more attention and resource to the basic needs of water and food supply - and in turn our most critical resource - the farmer.