Hydropolitics
and Geopolitics in Africa:
Impact
of Water on Communities,
Food
Security, Transnational Relationships, and Development
April
22-23, 2004
Current
thinking projects that the main conflicts in Africa
during the next 25 years are likely to be over water, as population pressures
increase competition over water resources. Potential “water wars” are likely in
areas where rivers and lakes are shared by more than one country. 1,386,000
km3 of water is available on earth. Only 2.5% of that volume is fresh water.
Less than 1% of the fresh water is usable in a renewable fashion. Access to water affects agricultural
productivity, food security and people’s livelihoods. Effective water management
thus needs to be multi-objective, and has to deal with competing priorities and
often conflicting interests over a range of interlocking challenges from
satisfying needs for drinking water, water for irrigation schemes, balancing
urban and rural uses, reconciling interests of riparian states over trans
boundary rivers, electricity generation; crop production, fisheries, maintaining
a sound environment, affording an environmentally sustainable development,
preserving natural beauty to encouraging tourism and
protecting cultural and social aspects of communities.
Balancing
all of the above interests is especially challenging because of the
trans-boundary nature of rivers and lakes.
There are 263 watersheds shared by two or more countries in the
world. These trans-boundary basins
cover 45.3% of the earth. Together they house about 40% of the world population
and represent 60% of the global river flow. Some 85% of Africa’s
water resources are comprised of large river basins shared between several
countries. In Africa
there are well over 70 international rivers. For example, the
Nile is
shared by 10 countries, the Volta by
6, the Niger by
11, Lake
Chad by
8, the Congo by
9 and the Zambezi by
9. This is compounded by the fact
that the amount of available water is diminishing. The flow of the Nile
has decreased from 84 km3 in 1954 to 52 km3 in 2004;
Lake
Chad
from 25,000 km2 in 1960 to 2,000 km2 in 2004. High rates of population growth
accompanied by continued increases in the demand for water have resulted in
several countries passing the point where the scarcity of water supplies
effectively limits further economic development.
Present
population trends and patterns of water use suggest that more African countries
will exceed the limits of their economically usable water-based resources before
2025. A related matter is that
Africa’s
water supply systems lag behind those of the rest of the world, in both extent
and quality. This presents a major
obstacle to economic growth and can have severe negative consequences for the
living standards of the population. Water also has major impact on health. In some countries the response has been
to privatize water distribution systems.
Establishing private sector participation in Africa’s
water supply offers enormous promise but also huge challenges. For example one of the major issues that
have arisen is how to make sure that tariffs adopted by the water companies are
affordable to the ordinary people.
A related matter is how to ensure that the private sector does not ignore
the poor in urban centers and the rural areas as the profit motive predominates
in its operations and decision-making on the viability of
projects.
It
is hoped that the Symposium will bring together an interdisciplinary group of
experts in the management of water resources, economists, political scientists
and other disciplines to discuss the issues raised above. It is hoped that through an
exchange of views and experiences, the symposium will determine the major
challenges posed by the increasing scarcity of water resources and recommend
possible solutions and practices for the management of this scarce resource and
thereby defuse the possibility of conflict.
It
is proposed to organize the symposium along the following
themes:
·
-Transnational
Conflict and/or Cooperation in Managing Water
Resources
·
-Water
Management, Politics and Governance
·
-People,
Water and Technology at the Local Level
·
-Power
Dams and Environment
·
-Water
Privatization
·
-Water
and Public Health.
The
Symposium is organized by the Institute for African Development (IAD) at
Cornell
University.
Those who wish to participate in the Symposium are invited to submit abstracts
of no more than 2-3 pages or completed papers.
The
submission deadline for the abstracts is February
15, 2005. Proceedings of the Symposium will
be published. Submissions should be
sent electronically to: CIAD@Cornell.edu Inquiries concerning the Symposium
should be directed to:
Jackie
Sayegh, Program Coordinator,
Institute
for African Development, Mario
Einaudi
Center
for International Studies,
170
Uris Hall,
Cornell
University,
Ithaca,
NY
14853.
Tel
(607) 255-6849 / 5499
The
symposium is co-sponsored by the Africa Faith and Justice Network and the
Institute for African Development of
Cornell
University.
For more information, please contact Marcel Kitissou at (202)832-3412,
kitissou@afjn.org or Jackie Sayegh at (607) 255-5499 or jsb25@cornell.edu