Stockholm (dpa) - Delegates at the World Water Week on Friday
called for more action to ensure that the world's population is
guaranteed access to safe drinking water, sanitation and energy by
the year 2030.
Unless action is taken by 2030, "a business as usual scenario
(suggested that) humanity's demand for water could outstrip supply by
as much as 40 per cent," the Stockholm Declaration said.
"This would place water, energy and food security at risk,
increase public health costs, constrain economic development, lead to
social and geopolitical tensions and cause lasting environmental
damage," the statement added.
The declaration was supported - after a show of hands - by
participants at the international gathering of researchers,
politicians, business leaders and representatives of international
agencies.
Organizers said the declaration was aimed at influencing next
year's United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de
Janeiro, Brazil, sometimes called Rio+20.
Targets listed in the declaration included to increase water
efficiency in agriculture and energy production by 20 per cent by
2020, as well as decrease water pollution by one fifth by that year.
The week-long meeting in the Swedish capital was attended by about
2,500 particpants.
Solutions should especially target "the bottom billion," the
poorest portion of the world's population, said Adeel Zafar, head of
UN-Water that groups 28 United Nations agencies.
Anders Bertell of the Stockholm International Water Institute
(SIWI), co-host of the World Water Week, said that unless measures
were taken "water shortages will constrain economic growth and
inhibit food and energy production in many regions."
Other backers of the statement included the German Federal
Ministry of the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety,
the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development,
Conservation International and the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF).
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