for centuries Wars have been fought over resources but soon we could be seeing more fighting over arguably the most precious resource of all water there are too few resources for for too many people and they end up fighting uh with one another as climate change gets worse and the planet gets hotter and drier the fight for water is only going to intensify so where could we see water wars and How likely are they to actually happen by 2025 the UN predicts two-thirds of the global population will live in water scarce areas five years after that
it's thought that 700 million around the world could be at risk of displacement by water scarcity there's no gray area here people cannot live without water so a lack of access to water pretty much leaves you with two options either you move somewhere where there is access or you fight for what's available so looking back over the past 50 years we have yet to see a true water War typically countries don't go to war over any one single issue it's usually a complex mixture of issues that leads countries to go to war I'm not thinking
that that most water problems or climate problems if you wish end up in wars of the conventional sense of stay Russia versus Ukraine it's it's more the undermining of the social order uh that of course uh undermines security within a country but it can't bleed over into another neighboring countries or or even further away in 2018 The Joint Research Center listed these places as likely sites for so-called hydropolitical interactions the Nile Ganges brahmaputra induce Tigris Euphrates and Colorado Rivers here in Sudan where the Niles meet to form the longest river in the world violence over
water resources is sadly commonplace ancient Nubian and Egypt fought over control of the Nile Valley for centuries and in more recent times the Scramble for water and arable land has fueled inter-communal conflict around the country since 2003 200 000 people have been killed in Darfur on dafu indeed in many ways we are in a free fall it's a terrible situation and a resolution must come soon in the early 2000s fighting broke out between nomadic herders and sedentary farmers in the dry dockport region the change in climate of Sudan meant that groups had to compete more
and more for land and water the violent rivalry and government Crackdown killed and displaced hundreds of thousands of people scarcity wasn't the sole reason for this war but it was certainly one of the major causes of it clashes are ongoing today land is not good enough if you are rural communities you need to have water to make that land valuable so we have seen there in areas like Sudan like Darfur where there's been access to land issues and domination of land and use of that land leading to violence between communities and that is really the
concern for the future that the climate change that is already happening could be driving these sort of local conflicts ever more just beyond the country's borders a major controversy is brewing over water now one that has threatened to develop into a major war [Music] Ethiopian Renaissance Dam it's a huge Hydro power Dam on the Blue Nile a tributary of the Nile that starts in Ethiopia it's estimated to have cost billions of dollars and will eventually have a 6 000 megawatt capacity the equivalent to six nuclear power stations once fully active it will be the largest
hydroelectric power plant in Africa and will be a big boost Ethiopia's economy but it has also heightened political tension across the region Egypt relies heavily on the Nile in fact nearly all of its water comes from the river any disturbance to the water level could have massive consequences in Egypt something the country is well aware of this is someone literally someone's lifeline and this Grand Renaissance dam is being built across the segment of the Nile that that feeds Egypt with 85 percent of its water so they're deathly afraid of this um and they are doing
a lot of saber rattling even suggesting they're you know violent conflict could be in the cards since the first brick was laid back in 2011 Egypt has tried to stop the dam being built at times military conflict has seemed close in 2013 senior Egyptian politicians were caught on camera discussing whether to destroy the dam though advisor to the then president played that down to Sky News it would not be totally acceptable to talk about military options when they did not explore other options as well however exactly as you said it's a matter of life for
Egypt in 2019 Ethiopian president ABI Ahmed said No Force could prevent the country from finishing the dam The Filling of that diamond and these dams are massive Mega projects that take anywhere between five and ten years to to fill the dam Reservoir so it's during this filling stage which has already started where the greatest potential for conflict lives so there you might have some dry years and the flow of the Nile is going to be naturally reduced and less water will be allowed to flow Downstream as Ethiopia's interest will be to hold as much back
to fill the dam as fast as possible so during the next few years where the greatest potential for conflict between Ethiopia and Egypt really comes to Bear water wars have been happening for centuries but there's a big reason why we may be seeing more in the future climate change increasing Global temperature scores is more water to evaporate changing the water cycle that means more heavy rainfall in some places and more drought in others when we speak with local communities in different parts of Africa where I work local farming communities will use the present tense when
they talk about climate change impacts not the future they're not talking about a far-off future where rainfall is going to be altered they're talking about today and in some cases at that very local level we've actually seen that breakout into armed conflict between these groups as they're competing from for increasingly scarce Water Resources but all of this does not mean water wars are inevitable in the past countries and communities have been more likely to cooperate to tackle any water crises even at the Nile Dam despite years of tension it is yet to boil over but
there's no escaping the fact that the world is getting hotter and drier and has access to such a vital resource like water becomes more and more difficult for people globally they could turn to more Extreme Measures to secure it Greater pressures placed on Water Resources the need for economies to continue growing but need for cities to take on board more and more products and services that are water intensive and of course climate change changing that whole scenario that could change things the future could look different to the Past
