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km3 1 Brazil 8,233 2 Russia 4,498 3 Canada 3,300 4 United States 3,069 5 Indonesia 2,838 6 China 2,830 7 Colombia 2,132 8 Peru 1,913 9 India 1,908 10 Democratic Republic of the Congo 1,283 11 Venezuela 1,233 12 Bangladesh 1,211 13 Burma 1,046 14 Chile 922 15 Vietnam 891 16 Republic of the Congo 832 17 Argentina 814 18 Papua New Guinea 801 19 Bolivia 622 20 Malaysia 580 21 Philippines 479 22 Cambodia 476 23 Mexico 457 24 Ecuador 432 25 Japan 430

      Even in what is considered a highly advanced country like the United States, which receives 3,069 km3 a year of renewable fresh water and has historically invested in water infrastructure as well as the management of its water resources, it is estimated that as of 2014, 1.6 million people (0.5% of its population) were without a toilet, a tub or shower, or running water (UNC Environmental Finance Center 2017). Despite availability of renewable fresh water resources, equitable and affordable supply and access to these resources remain a significant challenge, particularly to minority and low-income communities, even in the most developed countries in the world.

      Figure 1.1 Total daily per capita water consumption by selected country. Data from Grace Communication Foundation (2019).

      1.4 Global Water Resource Issues

      The root of all major issues pertaining to global water resources today stems from a lack of water accessibility. It is estimated that over 1 billion people live without access to safe water (WHO 2017). This number more than doubles to over 2.3 billion people when basic sanitation services are considered. It is this lack of access to safe drinking water and adequately treated wastewater that drives other major water-related issues in the world today. As indicated earlier, this access issue stems directly from the lack of necessary water infrastructure as well as the poor maintenance and management of the limited infrastructure that currently exists.

      Improved water resource management and water storage capacity makes an economy more resilient to external shocks, such as rainfall variability, and thus provides a stable and sustainable base for increased food and industrial productivity and production to maintain economic growth and development. Consider a heavily water-dependent country like Kenya where frequent floods and droughts take a heavy toll on the economy (SIWI 2005). These floods and droughts translate to a direct long-term fiscal liability and decline in economic growth of about 2.4% of Kenya’s annual GDP (SIWI 2005). Much of this loss in economic output comes from lack of adequate water storage capacity, a deficit of more than $10 billion in 2004 (SIWI 2005). If Kenya, as for many other African countries, had invested in storage facilities for water, they would be able to store the excess water received in heavy flood years for use in heavy drought years, thus, avoiding flood liabilities and water scarcity cost, allowing the country to avoid the drops in economic growth that have occurred in the past.

      In today’s world, the term hydro-politics is becoming more and more known. Hydro-politics can be defined as debate or conflict

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