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Can Man's Greatest Necessity Become His Greatest Calamity?
By Hwaa Irfan 24/09/2001
Note: This article has been revised from its original format by the Science and Health section editor to pertain to the event in the U.S. on Tuesday, September 11, 2001.
After Tuesday's terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and on the Pentagon near Washington, DC, many people lined up at gas stations in a mass panic about gas shortages. With the future before them unknown, some people began to stockpile emergency supplies.
The attacks made it glaringly obvious to many that they put away their Y2K supplies too soon. In fact, any emergency can create a need for emergency supplies.
On top of all the people that lost a loved one, their homes, or their jobs in Tuesday's attack, what if the situation
had escalated to the point where not only gas, but also food and water were in short supply? We often take such basics of life for granted, but things like gas, food and water should never be taken for granted. Fresh water, in fact, is probably the most important of all resources on the earth.
Nothing can exist without water, so what would we do if our drinking supply ran out - temporarily or permanently? Seeking to avert this as a possibility, alarms were sounded once again last month at the 2001 Stockholm Water Symposium when the results of a study by the International Water Management Institute threw further light on the matter.
The world's fresh water supplies are, it seems, once again threatened - reminding us that Allah (SWT) gave us one world in which to live interdependently. However, as the study showed, Asia and sub-Saharan Africa would bear the brunt of any worldwide water shortage that may occur (ENS, p.1). This is because they are heavily reliant on irrigation.
The first irrigated civilizations appeared in contemporary Iraq and Pakistan approximately 5,000 years ago when the precious benefits of fresh water to new cities were beginning to be realized (Reisner, p.69). Since then, irrigation has continued to help high population areas far from fresh water supplies avert hunger.
However, modern intensive single crop farming techniques drain more water than is replenished by the gift of rainfall. Last year, the United Nations' four million dollar report, "PAGE", revealed that we use 54% of the earth's rainfall with 70% of this going towards agriculture (Kluger, p.49). The widespread use of fertilizers and pesticides hasn't helped; rather, it has polluted water resources and reduced our fresh water supply (Environlink, p.1).
A case in point is the Aral Sea in Central Asia, which has shrunk to less than half its former size since the 1960's. It used to be replenished by the two big rivers, Amu Darya and Syr Darya. However, a grand-scale hydraulic project inspired by Joseph Stalin has continuously diverted that water to irrigate millions of hectares of cotton in Uzbekistan. The result has been the destruction of one of the world's largest inland fisheries, as well as dust storms poisoned by heavy metals and pesticides that wash into the disappearing lake (Reisner, p.68).
River water is more mineralized than rainfall, and long desert rivers like the Tigris and Colorado are especially salty. Irrigating a hectare of cropland for a year leaves several tons of salt to disperse into the soil. Sandra Postel of the Worldwatch Institute cites seven million (three million hectares) of salt-burdened land in India; six million in China; and over four million in Pakistan in her book
Pillar of Sand (Reisner, p.72). In addition to oil seepage into the Persian Gulf, salt-laden wastewater from the oil production process has been dumped into the Gulf, increasing its salinity. An Arab environmental organization has stated that this is a result of global warming compounded by indiscriminate dumping of wastewater.
Executive Secretary Dr. Abdul Rahman al-Awadi of the Regional Organization for the Protection of the Marine Environment noticed the first fish carcasses as a result of water pollution in 1999. The construction of dams on the rivers Tigris and Euphrates have reduced fresh water supply in the region to a trickle. The citizens of Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Kuwait rely on desalinated Gulf water (Sarkar, pp.1, 2).
In Syria, Professor of Water Engineering Shebli al-Shami at Damascus University stated, "The year 2001 is the year of water balance, which means the revenues are equal to consumed amounts of water." Syria has been exposed to drought for the past three years, affecting the reservoirs of ground-water supply as indicated by the drying up of the springs that feed Damascus (Arabic News.com #2, p.1). Dr Nuhad Abdallah of Tishreen University, in referring to the Syrian coast, cites the seawater pollution as a product of untreated sewerage water and industrial wastes, which empty into the sea through the rivers. Ground water supply is also polluted from untreated industrial and domestic wastewater along with pesticides and fertilizers, which in turn affect the arable land (ArabicNews.com #1, p. 2). As a result, water management in Damascus has necessitated the reduction of the water supply for 18 to 20 hours a day (ArabicNews.com #2 p.1).
As we clear away more and more land to facilitate modern lifestyles, we disregard the intrinsic balance of the interrelationships that Allah (SWT) has created. Vegetation influences the exchange of radiation between the biosphere and the atmosphere; influences land-surface radiation, and also plays a hydrological role (Dube, pp. 1, 4,5). The earth relies on an envelope of clouds for moisture. Through the medium of rainfall and snow, clouds feed land-based resources. As it seeps through rocks and unadulterated soil, this water preserves wells and becomes mineralized (Olzewski, p.1).
In less than a century, humanity has gone from being an agricultural society to being a society of mega-cities (Thompson p.50). By decreasing the volume of land that is openly exposed, we have decreased our natural resources and affected not just "our part of the world", but elsewhere as well. In Japan, environmentalists like Yoshitoshi Era have prodded the local government to increase government land purchases. "We have to protect what is left," he said (Thomas, p.52).
Will this be enough, or should we consider restoring some land to its natural state as well as re-plan cities so that their residents live within a wider ecosystem? For without our land being exposed to the elements, we stand to eradicate humanity.
Does this sound alarmist, or are we really taking far too much for granted?
"Say: Have you considered, if your water should go down, who is it then that will bring you flowing water?" (Sura'tul Mulk, 67:30).
Sources:
ArabicNews.com #1. "Syrian Environmentalist: It is High Time now for the Reconciliation of Man and Its Surroundings for Sustainable
Development." ArabicNews.com. 09/15/01.
ArabicNews.com #2. "Waters Will Be Completely Dry If Drought Continues in Four More
Years." ArabicNews.com. 07/29/01
Dube, Andrea. "How Flora and Fauna Influence Climatic Change."
Uoguelph.ca. 09/12/01.
ENS. "Pressure Rising on Worlds' Fresh Water Supply." Environmental News Service. 08/15/01.
Environlink "Intensive Farming Fails to Feed the World - Study". 02/19/01. 1-2. Reuters. 02/19/01.
Kluger, Jeffrey. "Population." Time. 155:16a (2000) 44-49.
Olzewski, John "Rainfall by Whos' Standards." Economist.com. 09/12/01.
Reisner, Marc. "Freshwater." Time.155:16a (2000) 66-73.
Sarker, Sudeshna. "Persian Gulf Turning Hot, Salty, Oily." Lycos Network. 08/15/01.
Thompson, Dick "Sprawl." Time. 155:16a (2000) 50-51.
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