Sink or Swim? Water security for growth and development
Sink or Swim? Water security for growth and development
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DOI：
10.2166/wp.2007.021
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发表时间：
2007-01-01
期刊：
影响因子：
1.6
通讯作者：
Sadoff, Claudia W.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Grey, David;Sadoff, Claudia W.
实现基本的水安全，既利用水的生产潜力，又限制其破坏性影响，一直是社会的优先事项。为了抓住这一双重性，水安全在此被定义为：为健康、生计、生态系统和生产提供数量和质量可接受的水，同时对人、环境和经济造成的与水有关的风险也达到可接受的水平。本文件广泛地审视了那些已经实现水安全的国家、它们选择的道路和付出的代价，以及那些尚未实现水安全的国家及其对经济和社会的制约。它界定了三种类型：已利用水文的国家、受水文阻碍的国家和受制于水文的国家。报告发现，仍受水文影响的国家通常是世界上最贫穷的国家。它们面临"困难的"水文条件，其特点往往是年内和年间降雨量和径流量变化很大，所需的体制和基础设施投资水平很高，而投资能力很低。本文件试图以一个假想的水与增长"S曲线"来描述实现水安全的动态，该曲线说明了对水机构和基础设施的最低限度投资平台如何能够产生一个转折点，超过这个转折点，水对增长的积极贡献将越来越大，以及这个转折点在不同情况下将如何变化。由于存在着不可避免的权衡取舍，实现水安全从来都不是没有社会和环境代价的;在一些国家，这些代价是巨大的，往往是不可预见的，甚至是不可接受的。这一简短的分析表明，历史上唯一证明的在国家层面实现水安全的途径是通过投资于互补机构和基础设施的不断发展的平衡，但以更可持续和平衡的方式遵循这一基本路径的经验教训是存在的。为平衡和排序投资、适应不断变化的价值观和优先事项以及降低社会和环境成本提供了见解。该文件的结论是，与上个世纪实现水安全的国家相比，大多数水不安全国家今天面临的挑战要大得多，而这些国家今天都是富裕国家。他们面临更困难的水文学问题，对水管理中固有的社会和环境权衡问题有更深的理解，因此也负有更大的责任。贫穷国家若不能实现水安全，在人类苦难、持续贫穷、增长受限和社会动荡方面的代价将非常高昂，因此，实现水安全是一项必须得到承认和应对的挑战。
Achieving basic water security, both harnessing the productive potential of water and limiting its destructive impact, has always been a societal priority. To capture this duality, water security is defined here as the availability of an acceptable quantity and quality of water for health, livelihoods, ecosystems and production, coupled with an acceptable level of water-related risks to people, environments and economies. This paper looks broadly at those countries that have achieved water security, the paths they chose and the costs they paid, and those countries that have not achieved water security and how this constrains economies and societies. It defines three typologies: countries that have harnessed hydrology, those hampered by hydrology and those that are hostage to hydrology. It finds that countries remaining hostage to hydrology are typically among the world's poorest. They face "difficult" hydrologies often characterized by high inter- and intra-annual rainfall and runoff variability, where the level of institutional and infrastructure investment needed is very high and the ability to invest is low. This paper seeks to capture the dynamics of achieving water security in a hypothetical water and growth "S-curve", which illustrates how a minimum platform of investments in water institutions and infrastructure can produce a tipping point beyond which water makes an increasingly positive contribution to growth and how that tipping point will vary in different circumstances. As there are inevitable trade-offs, achieving water security is never without social and environmental costs; in some countries these are significant, often unforeseen and even unacceptable. This brief analysis suggests that the only historically demonstrated path to achieving water security at the national level has been through investment in an evolving balance of complementary institutions and infrastructure, but that lessons exist for following this basic path in more sustainable and balanced ways. Insights are provided for balancing and sequencing investments, adapting to changing values and priorities, and pushing down the social and environmental costs. The paper concludes that most water-insecure countries today face far greater challenges than those that achieved water security in the last century and are wealthy countries today. They face more difficult hydrologies and a greater understanding of and therefore greater responsibility for, the social and environment trade-offs inherent in water management. As the costs of poor countries not achieving water security, in terms of human suffering, sustained poverty, constrained growth and social unrest, would be very high, achieving water security is a challenge that must be recognized and must be met.