Charting our water future-Mckinsey

Executive Summary

2030 Water Resources Group—a consortium of mostly private companies from several important sectors of the world economy—has made it their business to put together this report. The report’s central message is that any strategy to achieve water resource security must be a joint effort—integrated with broader economic decision-making—by governments, investors, NGOs, and water users in agriculture, industry and cities.

Charting our water future is a report of the 2030 Water Resources Group, which was formed in 2008 to contribute new insights to the increasingly critical issue of water resource scarcity. Members include McKinsey & Company, the World Bank Group, and a consortium of business partners: The Barilla Group, The Coca Cola Company, Nestlé SA, New Holland Agriculture, SAB Miller PLC, Standard Chartered and Syngenta AG.


Growing competition for scarce water resources is a growing business risk, a major economic threat, and a challenge for the sustainability of communities and the ecosystems upon which they rely. It is an issue that has serious implications for the stability of countries in which businesses operate, and for industries whose value chains are exposed to water scarcity.

• The ever-expanding water demand of the world’s growing population and economy, combined with the impacts of climate change, are already making water scarcity a reality in many parts of the world—and with it we are witnessing severe damage to livelihoods, human health, and ecosystems. In just 20 years, this report shows, demand for water will be 40 percent higher than it is today, and more than 50 percent higher in the most rapidly developing countries.
• The report also finds that the future “water gap” can be closed. Even in rapidly developing, water-scarce countries, there is a set of measures—to boost efficiency, augment supply, or lessen the water-intensity of the economy—that in principle could meet human and environmental water needs at affordable cost. The report shows how “crop per drop” can be increased dramatically in agriculture, which today consumes 70 percent of the world’s water. This has also been the message the United Nations Secretary-General’s Advisory Board on Water and Sanitation has kept on conveying to decision-makers: that water requires more political attention and strategic thinking.
• This report provides, however, is a toolkit that stakeholders can use to compare the impact, cost and achievability of a range of different measures and technologies, so providing the fact base needed to underpin solutions.

The report offers case studies from four countries with drastically different water issues, which will collectively account for 40 percent of the world’s population, 30 percent of global GDP and 42 percent of projected water demand in 2030: China, India, South Africa and Brazil. The report’s methodology identifies supply- and demand-side measures that could constitute a more cost effective approach to closing the water gap and achieve savings in each country.


Read the executive summary (PDF—1.2 MB)
Read the full report (PDF—5.3 MB)
NOTE:Watch the Flash Video at http://www.mckinsey.com/clientservice/Water/Charting_our_water_future.aspx

Further Readings
Water Security in India Conference
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Also see the 102 page Book-INDIA’S WATER ECONOMY-BRACING FOR A TURBULENT FUTURE

Author is John Briscoe ,Professor of the Practice of Environmental Health,Harvard.
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More Readings:
Adapting Water Management to Climate Change-SIWI Pdf