The THRIVE Project’s Post

According to a recent report on "The Economics of Water" by the Global Commission on the Economics of Water, we need a sea change to avoid irreversible collapse scenarios and massive suffering. Time to act, now! Here is a quick summary of this sobering report: "The world faces a growing water disaster. For the first time in human history, the hydrological cycle is out of balance, undermining an equitable and sustainable future for all. We can fix this crisis if we act more collectively, and with greater urgency. Vitally too, restoring stability of the water cycle is critical not only in its own right, but to avoid failing on climate change and safeguarding all the earth’s ecosystems, as well as on each and every one of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It will preserve food security, keep economies and job opportunities growing, and ensure a just and liveable future for everyone. Decades of collective mismanagement and undervaluation of water around the world have damaged our freshwater and land ecosystems and allowed for the continuing contamination of water resources. We can no longer count on freshwater availability for our collective future. More than 1,000 children under five die every day from illnesses caused by unsafe water and sanitation. Women and girls spend 200 million hours each day collecting and hauling water. Food systems are running out of fresh water, and cities are sinking as the aquifers underneath them run dry. We have, fundamentally, put the hydrological cycle itself under unprecedented stress, with growing consequences for communities and countries everywhere. Our policies, and the science and economics that underpin them, have also overlooked a critical freshwater resource, the “green water” in our soils and plant life, which ultimately circulates through the atmosphere and generates around half the rainfall we receive on land. Most gravely, while itself a victim of climate change, the degradation of freshwater ecosystems including the loss of moisture in the soil has become a driver of climate change and biodiversity loss. The result is more frequent and increasingly severe droughts, floods, heatwaves, and wildfires, playing out across the globe. And a future of growing water scarcity, with grave consequences for human security. Nearly 3 billion people and more than half of the world’s food production are now in areas where total water storage is projected to decline. We need bolder and more integrated thinking and a recasting of policy frameworks to address these challenges." To read the full report: https://lnkd.in/d-8_wxfe Photo credit: Executive Summary of "The Economics of Water: Valuing the Hydrological Cycle as a Global Common Good," p.10 #ActonClimate #Sustainability

Highlighting parts of Executive Summary from the latest report of Global Commission on Economics of Water across posts as this needs to be the highest priority and most important object of focus urgently to sustain life on Earth! ******************** Part 1: From Crisis to Opportunity The world faces a growing water disaster. For the first time in human history, the hydrological cycle is out of balance, undermining an equitable and sustainable future for all. We can fix this crisis if we act more collectively, and with greater urgency. Vitally too, restoring stability of the water cycle is critical not only in its own right, but to avoid failing on climate change and safeguarding all the earth’s ecosystems, as well as on each and every one of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It will preserve food security, keep economies and job opportunities growing, and ensure a just and liveable future for everyone. Decades of collective mismanagement and undervaluation of water around the world have damaged our freshwater and land ecosystems and allowed for the continuing contamination of water resources. We can no longer count on freshwater availability for our collective future. More than 1,000 children under five die every day from illnesses caused by unsafe water and sanitation. Women and girls spend 200 million hours each day collecting and hauling water. Food systems are running out of fresh water, and cities are sinking as the aquifers underneath them run dry. We have, fundamentally, put the hydrological cycle itself under unprecedented stress, with growing consequences for communities and countries everywhere. Our policies, and the science and economics that underpin them, have also overlooked a critical freshwater resource, the “green water” in our soils and plant life, which ultimately circulates through the atmosphere and generates around half the rainfall we receive on land. Most gravely, while itself a victim of climate change, the degradation of freshwater ecosystems including the loss of moisture in the soil has become a driver of climate change and biodiversity loss. The result is more frequent and increasingly severe droughts, floods, heatwaves, and wildfires, playing out across the globe. And a future of growing water scarcity, with grave consequences for human security. Nearly 3 billion people and more than half of the world’s food production are now in areas where total water storage is projected to decline. We need bolder and more integrated thinking and a recasting of policy frameworks to address these challenges. Ref: https://lnkd.in/gE63G3Kk ****************** Healthy soil in the tropical regions like Amazon through reforestation, agriforestry is critical! #SaveSoil #RevitalizeRivers #PreventDeforestation #ForestsAreEssential #GreenUpToCoolDown

Highlights from Report released by Global Commission on the Economics of water continued Part 3 - The costs of inaction The human and economic costs of inaction will be substantial. Globally, total water stored on and beneath the Earth’s surface is unstable and declining across areas where populations and economic activity are concentrated, and crops are grown. High-population density hotspots, including northwestern India, northeastern China and south and eastern Europe, are particularly vulnerable. The poorest 10% of the global population obtain over 70% of their annual precipitation from land-based sources and will be hardest hit by deforestation. If rainfall that originates from deforestation hotspots were to disappear, growth rates in Africa and South America could drop significantly – by 0.5 and 0.7 percentage points, respectively. Intensely irrigated regions tend to see declines in water storage with some experiencing a rate of decline twice as fast as other regions. If current trends persist, extreme water storage declines could make irrigation unfeasible, leading to a 23% reduction in global cereal production. The economic impacts of such trends will be severe. The combined effects of changing precipitation patterns and rising temperatures due to climate change, together with declining total water storage and lack of access to clean water and sanitation imply that high-income countries could see their GDPs shrink by 8% by 2050 on average, while lower-income countries could face even steeper declines of between 10% and 15%. Disruptions of the hydrological cycle therefore have major global economic impacts. The water challenge becomes even more pressing when we recognise how much water each person needs daily to live a dignified life. While 50 to 100 litres per day is required to meet essential health and hygiene needs, a dignified life – including adequate nutrition and consumption – requires a minimum of about 4,000 litres per person per day. Most regions cannot secure this much water locally. Although trade could help distribute water resources more equitably, it is hampered by misaligned policies and the water crisis itself. Part 2 - https://lnkd.in/gcaxp6e2 #SaveSoil #SoilForClimateAction

For the first time in human history, the hydrological cycle is out of balance, undermining an equitable and sustainable future for all, says a new report from the Global Commission on the Economics of Water. More than 1,000 children under five die every day from illnesses caused by unsafe water and sanitation. Women and girls spend 200 million hours each day collecting and hauling water. Food systems are running out of fresh water, and cities are sinking as the aquifers underneath them run dry. Nearly 3 billion people and more than half of the world’s food production are now in areas where total water storage is projected to decline. In brief, we need a new economics of water. #water #foodsecurity #women #children #sanitation #sustainableeconomy https://lnkd.in/eQNUQmCW

🚨🚒📢 "The world faces a growing water disaster. For the first time in human history, the hydrological cycle is out of balance, undermining an equitable and sustainable future for all".💦 ☢ "The human and economic costs of inaction will be substantial. Globally, total water stored on and beneath the Earth’s surface is unstable 🌩️ and declining across areas where populations 🏘 and economic 🏭 activity are concentrated, and crops 🌽 are grown." The Global Commission on the Economics of Water has just released its last report, "Valuing the Hydrological Cycle as a Global Common Good". And it's scary 😰 📚 https://lnkd.in/eQErcYYf Mission #1: Launch a new revolution in food systems (promoting less water-intensive practices and food: bye bye, Green Revolution...) Mission #2: Conserve and restore natural habitats critical to protect green water (being the agricultural expansion, and associated deforestation, one of the main drivers of hydrological cycle alteration) Mission #3: Establish a circular water economy Mission #4: Establish a clean energy and IA-rich era with much lower water intensity Mission #5: Unsure that no child dies from unsafe water by 2030.

🌍💧 𝗚𝗹𝗼𝗯𝗮𝗹 𝗪𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝗖𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗶𝘀 𝗔𝗹𝗲𝗿𝘁 On October 17th, the Global Commission on the Economics of Water raised alarms about the ongoing "water catastrophe." Experts warn that, for the first time in human history, the water cycle is imbalanced, endangering a sustainable future for all. Without urgent global action, this crisis could jeopardize over half of the world's food production by 2050 To address these challenges, the Commission outlines five key missions: 1 - Revolutionize food systems to optimize water use 2 - Restore ecosystems 3 - Create a circular water economy, focusing on industrial processes 4 - Harness clean energy and AI to reduce water consumption 5 - Ensure safe drinking water access for all by 2030 💡 The cost of inaction will be far greater than the cost of action. Link to the report: https://lnkd.in/eczsJEpF #FutureofWater #Sustainability #Watermanagement #Climateaction

🌍 The Global Water Crisis Is Reaching a Breaking Point 💧More than 3 billion people are already facing severe water shortages, and the consequences are alarming. Entire crops are dying, threatening food security, while cities are sinking as groundwater supplies run dry. A new report highlights an urgent reality: if we don’t take action now, the situation will spiral even further out of control. From agriculture to urban infrastructure, water depletion's ripple effects impact lives and livelihoods everywhere. But there is hope. Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC) offers a sustainable solution by harnessing the ocean’s thermal gradient to produce clean energy and unlimited desalinated water. This technology can help tackle water scarcity while driving economic growth in vulnerable regions. It’s time to prioritize innovative solutions like OTEC to protect our most precious resource. https://lnkd.in/gqnCMuYB #WaterCrisis #Sustainability #ClimateAction #GlobalImpact #WaterScarcity

BATHINDA: An worldwide group of leaders and consultants warns that until humanity acts with better boldness and urgency, an more and more out-of-balance water cycle will wreak havoc on economies and humanity worldwide.In a report, ‘The Economics of Water: Valuing the Hydrological Cycle as a Global Common Good’, the Global <!-- -->Commission<!-- --> on the <!-- -->Economics of Water<!-- --> (GCEW) says the water disaster places at risk greater than half of the world’s food production by 2050.It additionally threatens an 8% loss of GDP in international locations across the world on common by 2050, with as a lot as a 15% loss in lower-income international locations, and even bigger financial penalties past.Weak economics, harmful land use, and the persistent mismanagement of water assets have mixed with the worsening local weather disaster to put the worldwide water cycle below unprecedented stress, GCEW says.Nearly three billion individuals and over half of the world’s food production are in areas experiencing drying, or unstable tendencies in whole water availability. Further, a number of cities are sinking due to the loss of water under the bottom. “Today, half of the world’s population faces water scarcity. As this vital resource becomes increasingly scarce, food security and human development are at risk — and we are allowing this to happen,” noticed Johan Rockström, Director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) and one of many Commission’s 4 co-chairs. “For the primary time in human historical past, we’re pushing the worldwide water cycle out of stability. Precipitation, the supply of all freshwater, can not be relied upon due to human precipitated local weather and land use change, undermining the idea for human wellbeing and the worldwide economic system.”A new economics of water The report argues that existing approaches have led to the water crisis. They ignore the multiple values of water across whole economies and in preserving nature’s critical ecosystems. The widespread under-pricing of water today also encourages its profligate use across the economy and skews the locations of the most water-intensive crops and industries, such as data centres and coal-fired power plants, to areas most at risk of water stress.Proper pricing, subsidies and other incentives must be used to ensure water is used more efficiently in every sector, more equitably in every population, and more sustainably.“The global water crisis is a tragedy but is also an opportunity to transform the economics of water – and to start by valuing water properly so as to recognize its scarcity and the many benefits it delivers,” said Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Director General of the <!-- -->World Trade Organization<!-- --> and a co-chair of the Commission. Current approaches also deal predominantly with the water we can see – the “blue water” in our rivers, lakes, and aquifers. They typically overlook a

🌍 The Global Water Crisis Is Reaching a Breaking Point 💧More than 3 billion people are already facing severe water shortages, and the consequences are alarming. Entire crops are withering away, threatening food security, while cities are literally sinking as groundwater supplies run dry. A new report highlights an urgent reality: if we don’t take action now, the situation will spiral even further out of control. From agriculture to urban infrastructure, water depletion's ripple effects impact lives and livelihoods everywhere. But there is hope. Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC) offers a sustainable solution by harnessing the ocean’s thermal gradient to produce clean energy and unlimited desalinated water. This technology can help tackle water scarcity while driving economic growth in vulnerable regions. It’s time to prioritize innovative solutions like OTEC to protect our most precious resource. https://lnkd.in/gqnCMuYB #WaterCrisis #Sustainability #ClimateAction #GlobalImpact #WaterScarcity #Innovation #OTEC #CleanEnergy

📣 New report from the Global Commission on the Economics of Water (GCEW) Titled 'The Economics of Water: Valuing the Hydrological Cycle as a Global Common Good', it provides a detailed outline of the value of water. This comprehensive report highlights the critical importance of understanding the hydrological cycle as a global common good. By doing so, we can ensure access and justice for all while safeguarding our vital ecosystems. Usha Rao-Monari, Senior Partner at Wellers Impact , co-authored the report in her capacity as a commissioner for the GCEW. The report provides several key insights: 📊 Economic Value of Water: Despite its essential role in human survival water remains economically undervalued. 🌧️ Global Connections: The hydrological cycle connects countries and regions through both liquid and atmospheric water flows, emphasising our shared responsibility. 🌍 Interconnected Challenges: Water scarcity is intricately linked to climate change and biodiversity decline, with each factor influencing the other. Read the full report here: 👉 https://lnkd.in/dfDjRwCM What is your perspective on these findings? Share your thoughts in the comments below! #WaterUnite #WaterCycle #Economics