The Economist's Special Report on Global Water Tension

The Economist has addressed the issue of water worldwide in a special report consisting of seven research articles. This series of reports highlights that the current world provides striking examples of environmental degradation, serving as a warning that the use of water has its natural limitations. The report mentions boats stranded amid disappearing waters that once belonged to the world's fourth-largest lake, the Aral Sea. It also discusses how Cape Town in South Africa prevented becoming the first major city on Earth to run out of water last year, while also referencing the situation in São Paulo, Brazil, four years ago, which faced water scarcity. The Economist adds that even the latest United Nations annual report titled 'Water Development Report' contains a sense of helplessness, indicating that over a quarter of the world's population, equivalent to one billion nine hundred million people—73% of whom are in Asia—live in areas where water is potentially severely scarce. The three main factors driving continued water demand growth are population, wealth, and climate change. The report notes that the global population is expected to reach about 10 billion by 2050, with the main uncertainty in calculating future water demand being the estimation of agricultural needs, which currently accounts for about 70% of water withdrawals. However, the impacts of climate change remain less predictable. Global water use is assessed to be six times that of a century ago and is expected to increase by 20 to 50% by 2050. The volume of water consumed is about 4,600 cubic kilometers per year, nearing the maximum level that can be sustained without dangerously depleting water resources. One-third of the largest groundwater networks in the world are also reported to be at risk of drying up. Consequently, the population experiencing severe water stress is expected to rise to 3.2 billion by 2050, or up to 5.7 billion when accounting for seasonal variations, and this population is projected not to be limited to poor countries; it will also include Australia, Italy, Spain, and even the United States. The report includes a map of areas on Earth, indicating that the Iranian plateau is among the regions where a large portion will face over 80% water stress by 2040, twenty years from now. In this map, the dry desert regions of Iran are depicted, with only a few small areas projected to experience water stress of between 40 to 80% or less than 10% in two decades. Water stress means difficulty in finding fresh water resources. In this context, water has once again flowed in the Hirmand River, representatives from Mazandaran protested against Rouhani's green light for transferring water from the Caspian Sea to Semnan, efforts to connect drinking water to Yazd following the renewed destruction of water transfer facilities, destruction of water transfer facilities, and clashes between officials and farmers in Isfahan, a protest gathering in Borazjan against drinking water shortages, severe government repression, and the risk of 'underground' protests, what doctors and eyewitnesses recount about the injured in the protests, the limitations of China-Iran relations amid the protests, summons and interrogations of cinema house managers and several filmmakers, accounts from three eyewitnesses of the massacre and the situation in several cities of Isfahan province, 'like war-torn areas', the death of the last Mossad representative in Tehran amid the Iran crisis, Trump announced an agreement to hold a meeting about Greenland in Davos, Trump emphasized 'stopping executions in Iran': we do not know what will happen in the future.