Water Crisis and Climate Change

One factor contributing to today’s global water crisis is undoubtedly climate change. 

Scientists believe that global warming causes an intensification and acceleration of the world’s hydrological cycle, leading to quicker evaporation and precipitation. The long term repercussions could be increased frequency of extreme droughts and flooding.

As temperatures increase, glaciers are fast melting away, rising sea levels are threatening to swallow these island countries. 

In fact, natural disasters are becoming more and more frequent and with greater intensity around the world. Frequency of those caused by the weather (droughts, hurricanes, storms, floods) is rising three times faster than that for otherst (such as earthquakes).

As temperatures increase, glaciers are fast melting away. The rising sea waters encroach into fresh ground water that is the principal reservoir of many island countries. More significantly, rising sea levels are threatening to swallow these island countries. 

In 2005, about 1,000 residents of Carteret Islands, Papua New Guinea, had to be evacuated due to rising sea levels. They are also the first in the world to be evacuated due to rising sea levels. Today, sea water has destroyed their coconut palms and food gardens. Some villages tried to hold back the tides by building sea walls from clam shells. But it is estimated that by 2015, the Carterets will be totally submerged.

To arrest the problems of climate change and heighten the urgency of doing so, the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) was formed in 1990. Since then, the AOSIS has been actively influencing international policies on climate change. 

And even if island countries are not engulfed by rising sea levels, the warming of the oceans can damage the delicate marine ecosystems and threaten the sources of livelihoods of the coastal communities who have depended on the seas for generations.

Today, faced with the realities of a global water crisis and climate change, we can no longer turn our backs and ignore the signs. Let’s only hope that we have not already reached the point of no return.