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International Year of Freshwater 2003 UN - UNESCO
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Water Photo Exhibition
Special online photo exhibition.  
 




Brazil from above
©UNESCO; Luis Alberto. Amazonia, Brazil.

Diverse by its very nature, water is solid, vapour and liquid. It is in the air, on the Earth’s surface and within its ground – ever changing and giving shape to a dramatic range of natural ecosystems, each as reliant upon water as we are.

The diversity of the resource means great disparities in its distribution around the globe. Some river basins are minute, others, such as the Amazon, are massive: the latter is the largest in the world and covers over 4.6 million square kilometres.

Nevertheless, our ecosystems are being damaged beyond repair through population growth, infrastructure development, land conversion, over-harvesting, introduction of exotic species, and pollution. Every day, 2 million tons of waste are disposed of into our waterways. 50% of the world’s wetlands have been lost since 1900, and a great many fish, bird and mammal species have also been lost.

Conservation organizations are taking action to ensure that the destruction of our vital ecosystems stops.





Industry: tanning in Morocco
©UNESCO; Dominique Roger. Fez, Morocco.

Industry consumes 22% of our freshwater withdrawals. We use it to produce our cars, our paper, our beer, our clothes. And even though some of the water we withdraw is recycled and returned to nature, more often than not, it is much degraded in quality.

In the tanning industry, skins are soaked in batches of water until they are clean. The environment often pays the price for this: the tanning of 1 kilogram of leather requires at least 35 litres of water, all of which is polluted in the process. As a result, in some areas of the world, there can be significant impact on local water resources, and on the surrounding populations’ health. This is the case for example in southern India.

In some countries such as Morocco, technologies have been developed to cope with the chromium pollution caused by tanneries. In Fez, one facility receives the tanning baths from 16 separate tanneries, recovers the chromium through precipitation and acidification, and then resells the water to the tanneries for reuse. This has reduced the quantity of chromium discharged into sewers and rivers by 90%.





Alternative energy: making a difference
©UNESCO; A. Testut. Iceland.

Energy is central to our daily lives, for heat, for cooking, for light. In developed countries, we take these for granted, but today, 2 billion people have no electricity at all, and a further 2.5 billion people have little access to commercial energy services. The problem is particularly severe in rural areas.

Population growth and rising urbanism will lead to a high increase in world energy demand in the 21st century. To cope with the growing demand, new technologies that do no pollute or otherwise damage the environment need to be developed. One of these is geothermal energy. Generally defined as heat stored within the earth, geothermal energy is already a major contributor to energy production in some countries. In Iceland, more than 45% of all energy production is supplied by geothermal energy.

Although geothermal energy has many advantages – it is reliable, renewable, and more environmentally sound than many other options – it nonetheless presents some challenges. It is a fairly expensive technology, not easily available to developing countries, and the gases it emits can be damaging to humans and the environment. Technologies are now in place, however, to reduce the impact of these emissions.





Rice fields and agriculture
©UNESCO; Dominique Roger. Indonesia.

Of all human activities, agriculture is by far the greatest consumer of water. Although irrigation techniques can be modified so as to use water more efficiently, still 70% of all water withdrawals go into agricultural production. Although most agriculture is rainfed, some 15% of the water used in the sector goes to irrigation. This amounts to about 2,000-2,500 cubic kilometres of water per year.

Agriculture remains the dominant economic sector in many countries of the developing world, among them Indonesia. Surprisingly, although almost 70% of the country’s population are farmers, Indonesia is the largest rice importer in Asia. In some places, such as the Chao Phraya River basin in Thailand, rice paddy is grown continuously throughout the year, leaving the land no time to be revitalized. To counter this, land doctor units help farmers to diagnose and remedy land degradation problems.

Current projections show that agriculture will continue to expand in the coming decades, with 60% of all land with irrigation potential in use by 2030, and dependence on groundwater resources could become problematic.





A woman’s work
©UNESCO; Alfred Wolf/Patrimoine 2001. Mali.

In Sierra Leone, an average woman wakes up. It is 4:00 a.m. Heading for the local pond, she catches the day’s meals. At 6:00, she completes her first set of domestic duties, heating washing water, cooking breakfast, cleaning dishes and sweeping. For the rest of the morning, she may work out in the rice fields, generally accompanied by her children. Before midday, she fetches and carries water back home, where she prepares food, and again washes the dishes. The afternoon is spent on a variety of chores, washing her family’s clothes, cleaning, carrying water, preparing the evening meal, cleaning the children. At 11:00 p.m., she goes to bed, preparing for the next day.

In some regions, women spend up to five hours a day collecting fuel wood and water and up to four hours preparing food. In Africa, 90% of the work of gathering water and wood, for the household and for food preparation, is done by women. Providing access to clean water close to the home can dramatically reduce women’s workloads, and free up time for other economic activities. For their daughters, this time can be used to attend school.

Women are the world’s principal food producers and providers and are assuming an increasing role in agriculture, partly because of the rural-to-urban migration of men. But they often remain underestimated in development strategies, and all too often are not given the means to produce as much as men. Many studies agree that national economies could largely improve if policies enabled women to contribute more to its agricultural production.





The Nile, not just a river in Egypt
©UNESCO; Dominique Roger. Egypt.

‘All of Egypt is the gift of the Nile.’ Spoken over 2000 years ago by the Greek historian Herodotus, these words remind us of the fascination the Nile River has long held for us. The longest river in the world, it flows through 10 African countries, bringing water and life to millions of people. It is both a vector of life, and a model of partnership and sharing.

Before air travel gave easy international access, rivers were the major transportation arteries, carrying goods and produce to cities developing on their banks. The Nile provided trade, stimulated economic growth, allowed Egypt to develop. The papyrus reeds growing on the river’s banks were turned into paper, baskets, boats and sandals. Every year, the Nile would flood, allowing Egyptians to build irrigation channels to carry water into the fields. The rich black mud formed by the flood waters revitalized the soil and enriched agricultural production.

Later, the Nile, still just as essential to everyday life, became a cultural site as well, an area for recreation and sailing. Today, the construction of dams, particularly the Aswan High Dam, has allowed a year-round supply of water.






Salt of life in Bolivia
©UNESCO; Alberto Jonquières. Bolivia.

Although water is the most widely occurring substance on Earth, only 2.53% of it is freshwater. The remaining 97.47% is saltwater. Of the small amount of freshwater, only one third is easily available for human consumption, the large majority being locked up in glaciers and snow cover.

In Bolivia, the high altitude and rate of evaporation have caused the total evaporation of the Coipasa salt flat, leaving only a flat surface of pure salt. This huge natural problem has created a significant drop in water supply levels for the local populations.

We have over time devised a number of ways to secure a more constant supply of usable freshwater, including the process of desalination. For this, salt water is drawn from the sea, and is filtered to remove silt and debris. It then passes through a reverse osmosis membrane, which serves to ‘squeeze’ freshwater from the salt water. The concentrated brine is rejected, and freshwater is produced.

Although seawater desalination has been the saving grace for a number of countries located in arid regions (particularly the Gulf States such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Libya, but also increasingly in areas like California), it is an extremely expensive process, and there are potential environmental impacts associated with the brine disposal.





Market time in El Salvador
©UNESCO; Dominique Roger. El Salvador.

Water use is increasing everywhere. The world's six billion inhabitants are already appropriating 54% of all the accessible freshwater contained in rivers, lakes and underground aquifers. By 2025 our share will be 70%. This estimate reflects the impact of population growth alone. If per capita consumption of water resources continues to rise at its current rate, we could be using over 90% of all available freshwater within 25 years, leaving just 10% for all other living beings.

The uneven distribution of water around the world means that in some countries, as little as 10 cubic metres of water per person per year is available (Kuwait), compared to 812,121 cubic metres in French Guiana.

We use water in each aspect of our everyday lives: to grow our food, to make our clothes, our books – everything we use and consume every day requires water. Agriculture, industry, energy – all these demands compete for a limited resource. Demographic and urban growth over the next century will mean a far greater demand for water for industrial production. Competition between users, and sectors, is therefore becoming increasingly important.





Our cultural heritage threatened
©UNESCO; Alexis N. Vorontzoff. Philae, Egypt.

The temple complex of Philae was built during the 3rd century B.C. This monument to ancient Egyptian religion and culture is also an example of cultural heritage threatened by the changes we have made to our environment.

The benefits of dams are certain: among others, they help to provide a constant flow of water to populations who may otherwise suffer through drought much of the year, and they boost agricultural and thus economic development. However, the construction of dams can lead to population displacement (the Three Gorges Dam in China is expected to displace 1.2 million people), and their environmental impact afford them a place among the most controversial issues in water affairs.

At the start of the 20th century, the Aswan Dam was built, and the temples of Philae were affected by the backed-up flood waters. In the 1960s with the construction of the Aswan High Dam in Egypt, the temples were threatened with permanent inundation. In 1977, however, the water was pumped out, the temples deconstructed block by block and reassembled on a nearby island.

Today, other cultural heritages such as the history of the Ba, an ancient Chinese culture through the construction of the Three Gorges Dam, could be lost if action is not taken.





Water for our future
©UNESCO; Ledru et Martel. Brazzaville, Congo.

Water is intrinsic to our lives and to the ecosystems on which we all depend. Every day, natural disasters such as floods and droughts, and human-made disasters such as pollution, damage the resource, and claim human health and life. Water is essential to life in every way: we need clean water for drinking, adequate water for sanitation and hygiene, sufficient water for food and industrial production, and much of our energy generation relies on or affects water supplies.

As the world population grows, so too does the great pressure placed on our rivers, lakes and groundwater aquifers. In many parts of the world, competition is increasing between uses, fighting for their share of clean, usable water. Global trends are not optimistic, and show increasing environmental, social and economic difficulties as result of the many competing pressures on our natural resources. During the past century, the world’s population has tripled while water consumption has increased six-fold. By 2050, even optimistic projections show that one in every four people is likely to live in a country affected by chronic or recurrent freshwater shortages. The situation is particularly worrying in sub-Saharan Africa: it is estimated that by 2025 nearly 230 million Africans will be facing water scarcity, and 460 million will live in water-stressed countries.

We have to act now, for there will be no second chance. Water for people. Water for life.


With special thanks to the Photothèque of UNESCO, BPI/AUD. You can access the Photothèque here.

The Year around the world: Discover what's happening in your country!
 ID: 4109 | guest (Read) Updated: 2004-02-03 11:13 pm - © 2003 - UNESCO - Contact