Long an abundant resource in much of Asia, water supplies are being drawn down by increased use from expanding industrial production, rising living standards and growing populations.
Experts have been warning for several years that Asians must reduce consumption and curb wastage or face economic and social disruption.
"Water tables are falling, rivers are drying up and competition for dwindling supplies is increasing," Sandra Postel, a water expert for the Worldwatch Institute in Washington, said in a recent report.
A World Bank study said water supplies in China "already are being siphoned away from farmlands surrounding Beijing in order to meet rising urban and industrial demands. With some 300 Chinese cities now short of water, this shift is bound to become more pronounced."
The International Rice Research Institute, based in Los Banos, Philippines, warned last year that competition for water between agriculture and industry could lead to social unrest.
"Projections suggest that most Asian countries will have severe water problems by the year 2025," the institute said in a report.
The proliferation of wells could dry up underground water sources in Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, it added.
"I suspect that in the next 50 years, we will see a shift from oil to water as the cause of great conflicts between nations and peoples," said Wally N'Dow, secretary-general of the U.N. Conference on Human Settlements held last June in Istanbul, Turkey.
Studies estimate about 60 percent of drinking water supplies in Third World cities are lost, either by illegal taps into the systems or leakage through rusted pipes, N'Dow said.
That compares with an average of 12 percent waste in the water systems of Britain and the United States, according to a U.N. survey.
Throughout the developing world, an estimated 20 percent of urban families buy water from vendors because they have no access to municipal systems.
In the Philippines, Public Works Secretary Gregorio Vigilar said only 10 percent of 800,000 households are connected to the sewer system. The rest use tanks that dump waste into canals and contaminate underground water.
If left unchecked, the contamination could severely limit the supply of safe drinking water, Vigilar said. A recent cholera outbreak in Manila killed seven people and sickened 310.
Copyright 1996, Associated Press, All Rights Reserved |
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