Water availability in MENA region could halve by 2050

The availability of water in the Middle East and North Africa region per capita is predicted to halve by 2050, even without the effects of climate change, according to the latest World Bank report.

The report paints a bleak picture unless greater efforts are made to protect this valuable resource. It adds that climate change could exacerbate the problem, causing heat waves and droughts.

“High-income countries can and must reduce their carbon footprints,” the report, quoted by the National, said. “They cannot continue to fill up an unfair and unsustainable share of the atmospheric commons.”

Oil rich nations were urged to take “aggressive action” in developing low carbon technologies to “free some pollution space for developing countries”.

The report was released ahead of a December meeting in Copenhagen to replace the current Kyoto Protocol on greenhouse gasses, which expired in 2012.

Jamal Saghir, the World Bank’s director of energy, transport and water, presented the report to Majid al Mansouri, secretary general of the Environment Agency in Abu Dhabi.

“We have to look into ways to strengthen our own research and development,” al Mansouri told the paper.