Brussels, 04/02/2008 (Agence Europe) - The link between climate change and world water resources are too clear for the policies to fight global warming to be carried out in isolation, if they are to have the effectiveness required. In order to face the challenge of the climate, we must aim to create integrated policies, which include the water dimension, both within the EU and in the climate negotiations of the UN on the post-2012. All of those taking part- MEPs and experts alike- in a hearing organised by the temporary committee of the European Parliament on climate change and chaired by Guido Sacconi (PES, Italy) in Brussels on 29 January, stressed this point. The objective of this thematic session- the fourth of its kind- was to reflect on the problem of climate change and world water resources, laying particular emphasis on sustainable development, changing the use of the soils, and forests.
In the view of Karl-Heinz Florenz (EPP-ED, Germany), rapporteur of the temporary committee, water and sustainable development are two indicators showing that CO2 is only part of the problem of global warming. “We must now focus on raw materials and resources, looking into ways of including agriculture in this debate”, he said.
Cristina Gutiérrez Cortines ( EPP-ED, Spain), who chaired the debate, pointed out that water has become a major theme of sustainable development. “In its interaction with climate change, water concerns all production-related questions. It is the resource with the greatest impact on the everyday life of human beings. The adaptation process will require many sacrifices and changes in our lifestyle”, the MEP warned. She is convinced of the need for a holistic and joint approach to water, together with “integrated responses”, taking account of the social and human aspects. However, she explained, legislators tend to take a disparate approach to it, due to ill-founded concerns of complexity.
Kaveh Zahedi, deputy director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), speaking on behalf of executive director Achim Steiner, described it as very difficult to determine “where water stops and climate change starts”. Pointing out that the challenge of climate change in terms of availability of water resources appears in all of the statements made by the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), he stressed that “nobody will escape the phenomenon”, not even the United States and Europe. “Let us talk not of climate change but of climate change/water together”, he suggested, because “any sensible policy must include the water problem”. And although the UN conference of Bali has sketched out the path for the next two years, it is clear that the international community must “tackle water before the Copenhagen conference of 2009”, where a global agreement on the post-2012 regime is to be agreed upon. “If we do not manage to conclude a solid climate regime for post-2012, we will be unable to respect the millennium development objectives”, he warned. He went on to plead for the mobilisation of the financial markets on this front, to be dealt with by the environment ministers within a UNEP framework in February.
Mr Zahedi pointed out that for just a few dollars, Africa, which “does not lack water overall, as its rainfall is sufficient to provide water for 13 billion people”, would be able to implement a rudimentary system to harvest water. The approach recommended by UNEP is based on restoring ecosystems, i.e. forests (as 50,000 square kilometres of forests have been lost to make agricultural areas in recent years), mountain ecosystems and humid areas, which are very important for the natural storage of water. UNEP, which is aware that the problem of water is a cross-cutting one, has established an international panel to evaluate the life cycle of biofuels, and will ask this body to include the water factor, as “it can take up to 1000 litres of water to create a litre of biofuel, which is 250 times more than the daily needs of an individual”. Ricardo Petrella, president of the European Research Institute on Water Policy, a committed defender of the universal right to water as a common good, laid emphasis on the human dimension of the world water shortage which deprives 1.5 billion people of access to drinking water and 2.6 billion to adequate toilet facilities.
Franz Fischler, president of the European Eco-Social Forum (and former European Commissioner for Agriculture), emphasises the urgent need to tackle the consequences of global warming “on agriculture, forestry, each and every one of us”. It affects agriculture at three levels: it is an actor of climate change as the world's principal consumer of water, an overexposed victim as it carries out its production out in the open, and a sector which may attenuate climate change and use it to its own benefit by producing biomass to replace gas or oil, as long as it is produced under sustainable conditions and as long as “the decision to produce biomass takes account of a possible reduction of CO2”, Mr Fischler stressed. The reduction in emissions may be achieved by storing gigatones of CO2 in the earth. Mr Fischler, who is optimistic about the opportunities offered by humus management as an alternative to storing methane in the open, would like the EU to make proposals as part of international post-Kyoto negotiations. However, he voiced his surprise at the confidence that has been placed in biofuel. “We are still a long way from viability in the biofuel sector, even in economic terms. We must place the package under R&D”, he said. (A.N.)