![]() One concern in particular is food security. Given that the marginal value of water use in irrigation is generally well below municipal and industrial uses, such outcomes are clearly linked with political, security and ideological concerns. Water losses are also high, estimated at 60 percent in some areas due to inefficient irrigation and domestic water supply networks. In Syria, agriculture accounted for 95 percent of total water withdrawals during the 2000s, compared to just 3 percent for domestic use and less than 2 percent for industrial use. It is also the largest consumer of freshwater resources. Today, agriculture remains a vital and volatile economic sector, generating 15 percent of Morocco’s GDP, nearly one quarter of the country’s exports and employing nearly half the labor force. ![]() Total Freshwater Withdrawal As Percentage of Total Actual Renewable Water Resources (%) This trend appears to be continuing: Total factor productivity growth was negative for most of the GCC countries over the 2000s and only slightly above 2 percent for Algeria. ![]() From 1960-98, growth in MENA countries was very capital intensive, with shares of capital much higher than conventional averages and negligible, frequently negative total factor productivity growth. On this score, the link between water constraints and future growth prospects also looks challenging. What matters is that the net marginal productivity of capital exceeds the higher output costs of water supply provision and that there are sufficient freshwater resources available. Maximum rates of output allocated to boost water supplies do not necessarily guarantee higher growth in water constrained environments such as the MENA region. Such figures do not bode well for accommodating future growth in water demand, with potential adverse effects for the region’s growth performance. In Morocco, an estimated 400 percent increase in public expenditure commitments to enhance urban, peri-urban and rural water supply and sanitation was linked with an estimated 75 percent increase in access to potable water from 2004/5-9. building dam and desalination capacity, with the costs of such investments likely rising with levels of water development. Region-wide, efforts to accommodate growth in demand focused primarily on “supply enhancement” i.e. Average Annual GDP Growth, Select MENA CountriesĮdited by James Goldgeier and Joshua R. Growth in “relative water demand” was commensurate-accelerating in the case of Syria from less than 20 percent in the 1960s to more than 80 percent by the 1990s.įigure 2. Is the pace and pattern of growth linked with rising water scarcity? From 1967 to 2011-a period characterized by “modern” growth rates, rapid population expansion and the consolidation of new nation states-per capita freshwater resources in several countries fell by an estimated 60 percent (Figures 2,3). In Saudi Arabia, for example, agricultural development policies and irrigation practices adopted since the 1980s are linked with an estimated depletion of two thirds of the country’s “fossil” water supplies. Such factors, however, have neither discouraged ambitious agricultural development schemes nor dreams of food self-sufficiency and security-frequently at high economic and social costs. In Syria for example, a predicted rise in temperature, lack of rainfall and unpredictable weather could result in desertification of 60 percent of land area. Arid conditions, low and variable rainfall and high rates of evaporation characterize the natural environment and compound the region’s vulnerability to climate change. Today, countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) are the most water scarce globally, with per capita freshwater supplies well below the water “poverty” line of 1,000 cubic meters per year (Figure 1).
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