by Farzaneh Roudi-Fahimi, Liz Creel, and Roger-Mark De Souza
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Also available in Arabic (PDF: 1.1MB)
(July 2002) The Middle East and North Africa (MENA)* is the most water-scarce region of the world. Home to 6.3 percent of the world's population, the region contains only 1.4 percent of the world's renewable fresh water. As population pressures in the region increase, the demand for water resources rises. This brief examines the challenges of meeting this demand given scarce water resources. Country strategies to deal with water shortages depend on local conditions, including topography, the extent of water scarcity, available financial resources, and technical and institutional capacity. Overall, developing a mix of strategies that increase supply, manage demand, and reduce long-term pressures on water is urgent more than ever before, as population pressures in the region continue to increase.
Fresh Water: A Scarce and Critical Resource
Water sustains humans' health, food production, and economic development. But only 3 percent of Earth's water is salt-free, or fresh water. Moreover, nearly 70 percent of fresh water is locked in glaciers and icebergs, and is not available for human use. The fresh water that is available comes from rain or from rivers, lakes, springs, and some groundwater reserves, such as aquifers.1 (Water below the water table, contained in solid or fractured rock, is known as groundwater; aquifers are geologic formations that store, transport, and yield groundwater to wells.) Today's wells can reach water buried deep within Earth, so these freshwater supplies can be depleted on a massive scale. Most aquifers can be recharged by