[Salon] Water: too little and too much

[Chas Freeman <cwfresidence@gmail.com>]

Water: too little and too much

Summary: Iraq’s water shortage crisis requires immediate action while a torrential downpour unseen since records have been kept paralyses Dubai.

This week saw a two day conference sponsored by the Institute of Regional and International Studies, American University of Iraq Sulaimani. While regional instability, the Gaza war and security issues were discussed water took centre stage. It’s not hard to understand why. As Iraq heads into its summer season more record-breaking temperatures are predicted and with them a continuation of the severe drought that has depleted reservoirs and dramatically lowered flow in the Tigris, Euphrates and Shatt al-Arab river systems.

A report published in February by the Carnegie Middle East Center details the extent of the unfolding crisis:

Iraq’s water crisis spans the length and breadth of the country. In 2023, after four seasons of drought in Iraq, water levels at the Mosul Dam, which has a storage capacity ranging from 6 to 11 billion cubic meters, reached their lowest levels since its construction in 1986…. Experts believe that if no action is taken, Mosul Lake might soon run dry, leaving the 1.7 million residents of Mosul without power and water for crop irrigation.

Meanwhile, the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, which also lies in the north, is not doing well, despite diverse water sources compared to the rest of the country….Reports have found that the Dukan Dam, which provides drinking water for 3 million residents in Sulaymaniyah and Kirkuk and has a capacity of 7 billion cubic meters of water, holds only 2 billion cubic meters….

Iraq’s south, however, is where the situation is at its worst….Towns and cities in the central and southern parts of the country depend heavily on the Tigris and Euphrates for water—all the more so in recent years, with precipitation levels 40 percent below normal, according to some studies.

Droughts are revealing more of the 3400 year old Mittani Empire-era city of Zakhiku which first emerged from the Tigris in Nineveh Governorate in 2013. The city was destroyed by an earthquake around 1350 BC [photo credit: Universities of Freiburg and Tübingen, KAO]

The report notes that infrastructure after years of war and neglect is in a sorry state. It is a situation that is exacerbated by a corruption culture that flourishes even as the physical evidence of the impacts of drought continue to pile up with a startling decline in agriculture production and a growing tide of farming families who have abandoned the countryside and are migrating to urban centres already stressed by water shortages.

Since 2021 the Norwegian Refugee Council has published an annual assessment of Iraq’s water situation. Some of the points highlighted in the most recent report:

1. 60 per cent of surveyed farmers across Anbar, Kirkuk, Ninewa and Salahaddin were forced to cultivate less land or use less water during the 2023 farming season.
2. 4 in 5 respondents in farming communities in Ninewa and Kirkuk had to reduce food expenditure over the past 12 months.
3. 1 in 5 respondents in Ba’aj linked climate change to increased social tensions, and 1 in 4 are thinking of moving because of drought.
4. 1 in 4 small scale farmers in Sinjar and Ba’aj reported being forced to give up farming in 2023, and almost 40 per cent had to reduce expenditure on food.

Climate change and corruption are not the only factors at play in Iraq’s water crisis. The catchments of the three major rivers in Iraq are all shared with neighbouring countries. Agreements with their neighbours have been signed but honoured only in the breech. At the Sulaimani conference the country’s Minister of Water Resources Aoun Diab noted agreements that go back decades as well as more recent ones. He cited the 1975 Algiers Treaty which resolved border disputes between Iran and Iraq but also gave the Iranians “complete control over the flow (of the Karun River).” A meeting next week with Turkish President Erdogan will have water “high on the agenda” the minister said before concluding “no transparent and honest agreement has been reached regarding the rate of water flowing into Iraq from neighbouring countries.”

And while Iraq heads into another summer of brutal heat and increased drought the vagaries of climate change were dramatically illustrated by a massive downpour that hit Dubai on Tuesday. Online videos showed streets awash, cars swept away and the international airport heavily flooded and forced to suspend flights. What exacerbated the impact of the deluge – 259.5 millimetres (10.2 inches) fell in a single day when the annual rainfall has typically been 100 mm (3.9 inches) – was that Dubai is a sprawling city of concrete and tarmac. The water had no place to go in a major urban center with a sewage system designed to manage very little rainfall.

The Emiratis have the financial and technological wherewithal to deal with the challenges thrown up by the Middle East’s climate crisis. 45 million Iraqis do not and until and unless viable solutions are uncovered to manage Iraq’s water crisis instability and insecurity driven by drought will continue to accelerate. A water conference in Baghdad next week will need to move beyond talk and into quick response mode to prove that the government is serious about beginning to tackle Iraq’s burgeoning water crisis.

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