Eco-Economy Indicators: WATER RESOURCES - Data

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Water Resources Indicator Data:

World Irrigated Area, 1950-2003 (figure and table)

World Irrigated Area Per Thousand People, 1950-2003 (figure and table)

Major Rivers Running Dry (table)

Disappearing Lakes and Shrinking Seas (table)

Underground Water Depletion in Key Countries (table)

World Irrigated Area and Irrigated Area Per Thousand People, 1950-2003
Year	Irrigated Area	Irrigated Area Per Thousand People
	Million Hectares	Hectares

1950	94.0	37.3
1951	98.1	38.2
1952	102.1	39.1
1953	106.2	39.9
1954	110.3	40.7
1955	114.4	41.5
1956	118.4	42.2
1957	122.5	42.9
1958	126.6	43.5
1959	130.7	44.0
1960	134.7	44.6
1961	138.8	45.0
1962	141.5	45.0
1963	144.2	45.0
1964	146.8	44.9
1965	149.8	44.9
1966	153.1	44.9
1967	156.1	44.9
1968	159.6	45.0
1969	163.7	45.2
1970	167.7	45.4
1971	171.5	45.5
1972	175.1	45.5
1973	180.2	45.9
1974	183.7	45.9
1975	188.1	46.2
1976	192.3	46.4
1977	195.7	46.4
1978	203.7	47.4
1979	207.2	47.4
1980	209.3	47.1
1981	212.5	47.0
1982	215.4	46.8
1983	218.6	46.7
1984	222.8	46.8
1985	225.2	46.5
1986	227.6	46.2
1987	229.3	45.7
1988	232.1	45.5
1989	238.7	46.0
1990	245.2	46.5
1991	248.6	46.3
1992	254.9	46.8
1993	258.1	46.7
1994	260.1	46.3
1995	263.7	46.3
1996	266.0	46.1
1997	269.8	46.1
1998	271.4	45.8
1999	274.1	45.6
2000	276.3	45.4
2001	274.9	44.6
2002	277.2	44.4
2003	277.1	43.9
Source: Compiled by Earth Policy Institute using 1950-60 data from Worldwatch Institute, compiled for Lester R. Brown, "Eradicating Hunger: A Growing Challenge," in Worldwatch Institute, State of the World 2001 (New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 2001), pp. 52-53; 1961-2003 data from U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), “Irrigation” data collection, FAOSTAT Statistics Database, at apps.fao.org, updated 19 January 2006; population data from United Nations, World Population Prospects: The 2004 Revision (New York, February 2005).

Major Rivers Running Dry

River	Situation

Amu Darya	The Amu Darya is one of the two rivers that feed into the Aral Sea. Soaring demands on this river, largely to support irrigated agriculture, sometimes drain it dry before it reaches the sea. This, in combination with a reduced flow of the Syr Darya—the other river feeding into the sea—helps explain why the Aral Sea has shrunk by roughly 75 percent over the last 40 years and has split into two sections.
Colorado	All the water in the Colorado, the major river in southwestern United States, is allocated. As a result, this river, fed by the rainfall and snowmelt from the mountains of Colorado, now rarely makes it to the Gulf of California.
Fen	This river, which flows from the northern part of China’s Shanxi province and empties into the Yellow river at the province’s southern end, has essentially disappeared as water withdrawals upstream in the watershed have lowered the water table, drying up springs that once fed the river.
Ganges	The Gangetic basin is home to some 450 million people. Flowing through Bangladesh en route to the Bay of Bengal, the Ganges has little water left when it reaches the bay.
Indus	The Indus, originating in the Himalayas and flowing southwest to the Arabian Sea, feeds Pakistan’s irrigated agriculture. It now barely reaches the ocean during much of the year. Pakistan, with a population of 161 million projected to reach 305 million by 2050, is facing trouble.
Nile	In Egypt, a country where it rarely ever rains, the Nile is vitally important. Already drastically reduced by the time it reaches the Mediterranean, it may go dry further upstream in the decades ahead if the populations of Sudan and Ethiopia double by 2050, as projected.
Yellow	The cradle of Chinese civilization, the Yellow River has frequently run dry before reaching the sea over the past three decades. In 1997, the lower reaches saw no flow for 226 days. While better management practices have enabled the river to reach its mouth year round during the past several years, flow levels are still extremely low during the dry season.

Source: From “Stabilizing Water Tables,” Chapter 6 in Lester R. Brown, Outgrowing the Earth: The Food Security Challenge in an Age of Falling Water Tables and Rising Temperatures (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2005), pp. 106-107. Updated by Elizabeth Mygatt, Earth Policy Institute, July 2006.

Disappearing Lakes and Shrinking Seas

Lake	Situation

Aral Sea (Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan)	Excessive diversion of the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, largely for irrigation, has shrunk the 5 million year old lake to about 25 percent of its 1960s size of 66,000 square kilometers. It now holds less than one fifth of its previous volume and has split into two sections. The larger South Aral Sea is unlikely to be restored, but the construction of a dam between the two sections, slated to be completed in September 2006, has already led to a rise in water level in the smaller North Aral Sea.

Lake Baikal (Russia)	Lake Baikal, the world's oldest and deepest lake, contains nearly one fifth of the world's unfrozen freshwater. Over the past century the amount of soil flushed into the lake increased by two and half times due to regional agricultural and industrial development.

Lake Chad (Chad, Niger, Nigeria, and Cameroon)	Lake Chad has shrunk from 23,000 to 900 square kilometers over the past 40 years, a result of increased irrigation and decades of depressed rainfall. The Lake, which once covered part of Chad, Niger, Nigeria and Cameroon, is now contained entirely within Chad's borders.

Lake Chapala (Mexico)	Mexico's largest lake is the main water source for Guadalajara's 5 million people. Its long-term decline began in the late 1970s corresponding with expanded agricultural development in the Río Lerma watershed. Since then, the lake has lost more than 80 percent of its water. Between 1986 and 2001, Chapala shrank from 1,048 to 812 square kilometers and its level dropped by up to 4 meters.

Dal Lake (India)	Lake Dal has shrunk from 75 square kilometers in 1200 AD to 25 square kilometers in the 1980s, to smaller than 12 square kilometers today. Over the last decade the lake has dropped 2.4 meters in height. All the untreated sewage of Srinagar city and some 1,400 houseboats is deposited directly into the lake. Other lakes in the Kashmir Valley are facing similar problems.

Dead Sea (Jordan, Israel, and Palestine)	At 417 meters below sea level, the Dead Sea is the lowest place on earth, and is falling by up to 1 meter per year. The Sea has shrunk in length since the early 1900s, from over 75 to 55 kilometers long, and has split in two, with the southern basin turned into evaporation ponds for potash extraction. The salty lake could disappear entirely by 2050, along with the 90 species of birds, 25 species of reptiles and amphibians, 24 species of mammals, and 400 plant species that live on its shores.

Dojran Lake (Macedonia and Greece)	More than 50 islands have appeared in the middle of the lake as overuse has dropped the water level by up to 3.48 meters below the minimal water level established in a 1956 bilateral agreement between Greece and Macedonia. Now with an average depth of 1.5 meters, the lake is turning into a swamp to the detriment of local plants and animals, especially fish.

Sea of Galilee (Lake Tiberias) (Israel)	The Sea of Galilee is Israel's largest freshwater lake, with a total area of 170 square kilometers and a maximum depth of approximately 43 meters. At 209 meters below sea level, it is the lowest freshwater lake on Earth and is expected to drop even lower as the lake shrinks and becomes saltier due to excessive water withdrawals, drought, and evaporation.

Lake Manchar (Pakistan)	Diversion of the Indus River, largely for irrigation schemes, has deprived Manchar, Pakistan's largest lake, of fresh water. Salt content has increased dramatically in recent years and the polluted water fosters diseases previously absent from the region. The lake had been a source of fish for at least 1,000 years, but due to its deterioration some 60,000 fishers have left the area.

Lake Nakuru (Kenya)	The lake has shrunk in area since the 1970s from 48 to less than 37 square kilometers today. Nearby forests are being cleared for farmland to feed a fast growing population, causing soils to erode and wash into the lake. Failed urban sewage systems and unregulated industrial effluent have polluted the lake.

Owens Lake (United States, California)	This perennial lake in southeastern California held water continuously for at least 800,000 years, spanning 518 square kilometers at its peak, but since the mid-1920s, after a decade of diverting water from the Owens River to Los Angeles, the lake has been completely drained. The dry lake bed, which contains carcinogens including nickel, cadmium, and arsenic, became the single largest source of particulate matter pollution in the United States, elevating air pollution in surrounding areas to up to 25 times the acceptable level under national clean air standards. Since 1998, Los Angeles has tried to abate these toxic dust storms by shallowly flooding a portion of the lake, reclaiming saline soils, and cultivating fields of salt tolerant grass.

Tonle Sap (Cambodia)	Tonle Sap performs the important function of holding excess water during flood season, yet siltation from eroding farmland and deforested areas has reduced the lake's capacity and has destroyed aquatic habitat.


Source: From Janet Larsen, “Disappearing Lakes, Shrinking Seas,” Eco-Economy Update (Washington, DC: Earth Policy Institute, 7 April 2005). Updated by Elizabeth Mygatt, Earth Policy Institute, July 2006.

Underground Water Depletion in Key Countries

Country	Situation

Mexico	In Mexico, where a third of all the water used comes from underground, aquifers are being depleted throughout the northern arid and semiarid regions. In a country where irrigated land is more than three times as productive as rain-fed land, the coming loss of irrigation water will be costly.
United States	Overpumping is widespread, and the overdrafting of the vast Ogallala or High Plains aquifer—essentially a fossil aquifer that underlies eight states, from southern South Dakota to Texas—is a matter of national concern. Water levels have fallen, sometimes by as much as 30 meters, since irrigation began in the 1940s.
Spain	More than half of Spain’s 99 aquifers are overexploited. In some of Spain’s smaller aquifers water tables have fallen by 40-170 meters in the last two decades of the 20th century.
Saudi Arabia	When the Saudis turned to their large fossil aquifer for irrigation, wheat production climbed from 141,000 tons in 1980 to 4.1 million tons in 1992. But with rapid depletion of the aquifer, production dropped to 2.2 million tons in 2005. It is only a matter of time until irrigated wheat production ends.
Iran	The overpumping of aquifers is estimated at 5 billion tons per year. When aquifers are depleted, Iran’s grain harvest could drop by 5 million tons, or one third of the current harvest.
Yemen	This country of 22 million people is unique in that it has both one of the world’s fastest-growing populations and the fastest-falling water tables. Under most of the country the water table is falling by 2 meters or more a year.
Israel	Both the coastal aquifer and the mountain aquifer it shares with Palestinians are being depleted. The continuous tightening of water supplies is likely to further raise tensions in the region.
India	Water tables are falling in most states in India as irrigation demands soar—there are now 12 million wells in western and southern India, compared with 100,000 in 1960. With thousands of wells going dry each year, India’s farmers are finding it increasingly difficult to feed 16 million new Indians each year.
China	Water tables are falling throughout northern China, including under the North China Plain, which produces half of China’s wheat and a third of its corn. China’s harvest of wheat, grown mostly in the north, has fallen sharply in recent years as irrigation wells have dried up.

Source: From “Stabilizing Water Tables,” Chapter 6 in Lester R. Brown, Outgrowing the Earth: The Food Security Challenge in an Age of Falling Water Tables and Rising Temperatures (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2005), pp. 101-102. Updated by Elizabeth Mygatt, Earth Policy Institute, July 2006.

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