55 % aller chinesischen Flüsse sind in den letzten 25 Jahren ausgetrocknet. In 110 Städten Chinas herrscht akute Wasserknappheit.
Um die Dürre nicht noch weiter zu fördern, importiert China Nahrungsmittel wie Mais und Weizen, deren Anbau sehr wasserintensiv ist. Außerdem kaufen die Chinesen Agrarland in Afrika und Südamerika auf, um die Abhängigkeit von US-Nahrungsimporten zu senken.
Wasserknappheit war auch schon immer ein Kriegsgrund, z. B. wenn ein Land einen großen Staudamm baut (z. B. Äthiopien), und das Land flußabwärts (Ägypten) infolgedessen unter Wassermangel leidet.
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www.sovereignman.com/trends/...5-of-its-most-valuable-resource-14900/
.....A study by China’s Ministry of Water Resources found that approximately 55% of China’s 50,000 rivers that existed in the 1990s have disappeared.
Moreover, China is over-exploiting its groundwater by 22 billion cubic meters per year; yet its per-capita water consumption is less than one third of the global average.
This is astounding data.
More than 400 major cities in China are short of water, with some 110 facing “serious scarcity”.
Beijing and other northern cities get most of their water from underground aquifers. Over the last five decades, China has had to drill increasingly deeper to gain access to water.
Another challenge China faces is logistics. More than 60% of China’s water is in the southern part of the country, but most of the usage is in the north and along the coastlines.
When you consider that this is a country that has almost one fifth of the world’s population and is soon to become the world’s biggest economy, this is rapidly becoming a global problem.
The Chinese are of course well aware of this and are trying to mitigate the consequences by diversifying internationally, or as I call, planting multiple flags.
In China’s case, it’s a ‘water flag’.
Since the most efficient way to save water is not to use it, a sensible strategy is to import water-intensive goods and commodities. Corn and wheat are great examples.China has been acquiring land across Africa and South America; last week when I was in Ethiopia, the place was crawling with Chinese delegates in the ag business.
The goal is to increase China’s food supply, reduce its dependence on the US for grain imports, and reduce its domestic water demand.
China has the economic capacity to do this. Most nations don’t.
Globally, some two billion people face a water deficit, and dozens of countries have to import water.
Throughout history, water has been the most important resource in the world and a major cause for conflict.
As far back as the ancient Sumerians, wars would break out over control of water supplies in Mesopotamia.
Today, 47% of the world’s non-polar land mass is supplied by rivers shared by two or more states simultaneously. This is an always present but latent source of potential conflict.
We can see that in South East Asia where the Mekong countries bicker over who has the right to build dams and otherwise exploit the river.
All of those countries, plus Bangladesh, India and Myanmar are furious with China’s plans to commandeer more of upstream river sources for itself.
In Ethiopia, where I was just a few days ago, the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam project on the Blue Nile is causing a major diplomatic row with Egypt.
The Egyptians see themselves as the historical “rightful owners” of the Nile River, and they’re in desperate need of the water.
Water availability has enormous political, military, economic, and social implications. And it’s foolish to simply sweep this reality under the rug. [A.L.: Es sind auch schon viele große US-Konzerne ins "Wasser-Business" eingestiegen...]...