Causes of water insecurity

  

Water insecurity caused by a lot of factors. The major cause of water insecurity is climate change occur in the world. Climate patterns are changing in the tropics and high latitudes,and decrease in the sub-tropics and mid latitudes. Studies indicate that, in future, changing patterns of precipitation will increase the risk of flooding and drought. Increased variability of precipitation will impact on the timely supply of water resources, and complicate water security efforts. Global warming also decreases the storage capacity of these glaciers in Arctic, it will increase water supply in the short term, but significantly reduce supply and altering river flow regimes in the long term.

  Not only that, degradation of fossil groundwater supplies also a major factor contributes to water insecurity.  Mining of fossil groundwater resources is most significant in North Africa, Libya, Algeria and Saudi Arabia. In these arid and semi-arid areas, fossil groundwater supplies are the only reliable source of water. However, as there is typically very limited recharging, mining of these resources is almost always unsustainable.

  In addition to that, water insecurity also caused by water quality and environmental assets. Deterioration of surface or groundwater quality makes water more difficult to treat. Increased flooding results in land degradation and an increase in contaminants washed into watercourses.  Moreover, human actions are also a significant contributory factor in the deterioration of water quality. Eutrophication of water supplies is identified as a significant water quality issue globally. Waste-water, industrial effluent and nutrient rich water from agriculture cause a rapid increase in algae and microscopic organisms in watercourses leading to oxygen depletion which damages the ecosystem.

  Other than that, ageing and poorly functioning water infrastructure also issued as one of the cause of water insecurity. In urban areas water supply and sanitation networks are often insufficient and subject to failure (leakage). The ageing of costly irrigation infrastructure has been identified as a problem in many parts of the world, and has been the catalysts for water security planning. Poorly functioning public irrigation infrastructure has forced farmers to switch to self-developed groundwater supplies, which in many places are now over-abstracted and can become non-renewable.