The International Herald Tribune
August 14, 2001
By Ramesh Thakur
TOKYO: Over the next 25 years, half the world's people will have difficulty
finding enough freshwater for farming and drinking. Asia's water stocks are
already among the most polluted in the world.
In parts of China and India, water tables are falling from one to three
meters annually. As water tables and the amount of arable land decline,
disputes over them are likely to multiply.
As countries in Asia and elsewhere strive to get or maintain access to vital
natural resources, environmental security will become an increasingly
important element in national defense. Disputes over water, for example,
could cause conflict between nations. Upstream states could manipulate
shared river basins to inflict pain on downstream states. Dams, irrigation
systems, desalination plants and reservoirs could be direct targets in war.
Half of the world's 6 billion people lack proper sanitation, and a billion
cannot get safe drinking water. Three-quarters of these people live in Asia.
Five million people die each year from water-related diseases around the
world. Water-borne bacterial contamination has the most devastating
impact on the poorest members of society, especially women and children
who lack basic food and speedy access to doctors and medicine.
If food scarcity and famine were to become a major problem in Asia, this
could cause domestic instability and a breakdown of law and order, or
provoke mass migration of people to other countries and a resulting
increase in cross-border tensions.
China is in the midst of the most rapid industrialization in the world. It is
likely to be the source of much of the increase in pollution in East Asia,
while still being a low per capita polluter. Any effort to catch up to its
industrialized neighbors in water usage would be catastrophic for already
stressed water resources.
Northeast Asia contributes heavily to ozone depletion, greenhouse gas
emissions and acid rain. It is also subject to great dust storms that sweep
across China, Mongolia and Korea.
A country would not tolerate thousands of its citizens being killed every
year by a foreign army. Why should the deadly effects of air and
water-borne toxins be treated differently?
The writer, vice rector of the United Nations University in Tokyo,
contributed this personal comment to the International Herald Tribune. The
university, with the support of the Ford Foundation, is engaged in a major
study of environmental security in East Asia.
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