Why  are there conflicts and disputes for the water?

In the XX century, the world population has  tripled  while the water consumption raised six times. Moreover, this natural  resource  distribution  is not balanced around the planet.

Water around the world

United Nation Organization (UNO)  has statisticsshowing that each human being living in a community needs  roughly 2.5 thousand cubic meters of water/inhabitant/year to perform his/her ordinary social and economic activities. In regions where water availability   is below 1.5 thousand cubic meters inhabitant/year, the situation can be considered critical.

In critical areas, the availability of water per person is only 3 cubic meters  per day. At some regions in Brazilian Northeast, the water availability is  3.8 cubic meters by day. Water comsuption measure (water/inhabitant/day) considered ideal for tropical regions is around 200 liters.

In  Africa – 44 million people  that live in urban areas  do not have access to water. From the people that live in rural zones, 53% (256 million)  don’t rely on basic water supply services.. In total numbers, 62%  from Africans  don’t have water. In regards to   sewage collection, 46 million   don’t rely on this service in urban zones and 267 million in African rural areas don’t have it either. There are 313 million Africans without water sanitation infrastructure.

 

In Asia – there are 98 million people without access  to water in urban  areas and 595 million, or almost 25%  from the rural population that are not supplied by treated water.  Totaling  693 million, or 19% from  Asians without water supply services.  There are more than  1.9 billion people (52% from Continent’s population),  that do not  have sewage collection services being  1.6 billion in rural areas and 297 million in urban zones.

In Latin  America  – 78 million people do not have  basic water supply services, what is equivalent to around 15% of the population. In regards to  sewage collection, the lack of  this service  affects 22% of the population and 51% of the rural dwellings. In total, 117 million  Latin Americans  and  Caribeans  do not count on   water sanitation services, including sewage collection

In Oceania – The totality of inhabitants from urban areas have access to water and only 3 million, that live in the rural areas are not supplied by treated water. In sanitation, 2 million are not serviced.

Only 0.5% from urban areas inhabitants are not serviced by basic water supply. In the rural regions, there are 23 million without water supply, what means 13% from the total rural population in Europe. In sanitation, 8% from Europeans (55 million) do not have access to sewage collection.

Soucers: Lecture of Gerson Kelman – National Water Agency (ANA) president – yielded to Rede das Águas, Aguaonline Magazine, Handbook of Tiete River and Vidagua Institute.