“Global water scarcity to increase by 40%”

Mihajlo Drajer

IB DP ESS SL

Mrs. Medenica

19/12/13

                “Global water scarcity to increase by 40%” is the title of the article found on eco-business website (but originally came from “The Sydney Morning Herald”); a page that’s dedicated to informing people on the news between the relationship with ecology and business. The article was chosen because it is strongly tied with what we’ve studied recently in our ESS class. Water and soil pollutions were two major topics that were covered in November/December – therefore this article is very applicable to the Current Event – as a topic.

                Briefly, the article is focusing on a recent study which identified the fact that water scarcity will become more prominent in a short time due to factors such as overpopulation, etc. It’s important to define scarcity before delving into the articles summary. Scarcity can be simply described as a lack, the antonym of a surplus. Also, the title of the article can be misinterpreted. Once you read the article, the title makes a bit more sense. It’s not saying how the current lack of water will increase in certain areas, but that other parts of the world will become affected by water scarcity – those of whom weren’t affected before. Water scarcity is a serious and significant issue since humans, plants, and animals aren’t functional without fresh water. It’s a fact that a person can survive a week without food, but without water you’re lucky if you’re still alive after 3 days. This is not surprising, since around 70% of our bodies are made up for water (humans).  “The Sydney Morning Herald” is the newspaper that the article was published in (without having the name of the author) and in their article they claim that the reason why there will be this ‘boom’ of 40% increase in water scarcity is because of the ever-growing human population. This is no surprise, since the amount of children born every year is overwhelming for countries resources. The term overpopulation is used to define a countries state once their population over exceeds their resources such as; coil, oil, fresh water, and so on forth. Countries such as India and China are facing serious issues with overpopulation to the point where the countries governments have to take serious precautions and control the people more. China implemented laws on having a single child, and no more back in the 80’s. India is supposed to be working on educating women on contraceptives, and safe sex in order to prevent this tremendous growth in their population. Another factor that affects water scarcity would definitely be the Earth’s temperature and climate. As more gases are released into the atmosphere, and as our ozone layer is depleted the suns presence is becoming overwhelming for life on Earth. Heat that’s too high for certain places will cause water to evaporate at a rapid rate, a rate which it didn’t evaporate at before. Regions such as the Middle East, and continents like Europe and the Northern part of the US (the south is excluded since they are already heavily impacted by water scarcity) are all regions which have minimal water scarcity however they are prone to being exposed to water scarcity if water consumption is not controlled (due to overpopulation) and as pollution encourages and evokes global warming and enormous changes in temperature.

                To reflect on the article; I found this article to be quite disturbing. It made me feel really worried since I live in Europe and water scarcity could become prominent on my continent. This is pretty significant for me since I unfortunately live in a place where water is actually taken for granted: where people wash their cars once a week, leave the tap running when brushing their teeth, spend ages in the shower, you get the picture. I can’t imagine my life where only a small amount of water is available; therefore this article did leave a great impact on me. The article made me realize how no-one is safe when it comes down to water scarcity, and that a large number of areas will face this problem other countries have been dealing with for decades.

 

Link to article; http://www.eco-business.com/news/global-water-scarcity-predicted-rise-40/

The article was published on the 19^th on December, in the “The Sydney Morning Herald” and on eco-business.com