"With an average annual rainfall of 1,170 mm, India is one of the wettest countries in the world. Still, even with its rich natural water resources, with more than 300,000 square meters of bodies of water, the country is plagued by environmental issues such as water pollution from raw sewage and runoff of agricultural pesticides (Sharma, 2005). Another major problem is that tap water is not potable throughout the country. This implies that people, especially those from the lower income bracket, cannot avail of clean drinking water, since these have to be bought. Repugnant as it may sound, it is a reality that millions of Indians queue up everyday at public taps for one of life's most precious commodity — water." -ADB

Friday, 25 February 2011

Global changes and water resources

-How climatic and human-induced changes will affect the world’s water resources.

-It has been difficult, even with current technology, to accurately assess the state of world water resources.

- There is no carefully maintained and clear record of global hydrologic change by which to judge the cumulative impact of human activities on the world’s freshwater and coastal support systems...

-While process-based hydrological research remains successful on a small scale, there is a critical need for synthesis studies of complex drainage basins on continental or global domains. This need has provided the impetus for several major international and national observational and modelling programmes.

-more on these studies at unesco site