World Bank: MENA Region Faces Unprecedented Water Scarcity

World Bank: MENA Region Faces Unprecedented Water Scarcity

The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region is going to face unprecedented water scarcity in the future, warned the World Bank.

In a report, titled "The Economics of Water Scarcity in the Middle East and North Africa Region – Institutional Solutions," it indicated that by 2030, the water available per capita annually in the MENA would fall below the absolute water scarcity threshold of 500 cubic meters per person per year.

With current water management strategies, a conservative estimate of water demand in 2050 is that an additional 25 billion cubic meters a year will be needed, equivalent to building 65 desalination plants the size of the Ras al-Khair plant in Saudi Arabia.

According to the report, existing institutions that manage water allocation across competing needs, particularly between agriculture and cities, were highly centralized and technocratic, limiting their ability to resolve tradeoffs in water use at the local level.

The report indicates that devolving greater powers over water allocation decisions to locally representative governments within a national water strategy could lend legitimacy to difficult tradeoffs in water use compared to top-down directives from central ministries.

World Bank Vice President for the MENA Region Ferid Belhaj warned that water shortages severely challenge both lives and