According to a report from the 2030 Water Resources Group, published by McKinsey & Co in November, in two decades' time, global demand for water will be 40% more than current supplies can meet. The report states: "Across the globe, policy makers, civil society and the business sector are increasingly becoming aware of the challenges facing global water resources, and the need to carefully manage these resources. Progress has been limited, however, and overall too slow."
The looming water crisis, believe the experts, is the result of a growing global population and expanding economies placing bigger demands on already depleted water supplies. Agricultural run-off and other forms of pollution are exacerbating the problem by making the supply of clean water even scarcer in some regions. Climate change is also contributing to the problem with more unpredictable and pronounced weather patterns leading to flooding and contamination of water supplies without sufficiently replenishing groundwater stocks.
Unfortunately, quantifying the size of the water crisis is not straightforward. Calculations around carbon dioxide and its contribution to climate change are complex and controversial, and the myriad interactions between usage, production and resources surrounding water can seem equally convoluted.
"The world's water crisis is not related to the physical availability of water, but to unbalanced power relations, poverty and related inequalities," the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) concluded in its Human Development Report 2006. As a result of these complex interactions, establishing exactly how much the hotel industry is contributing to the water crisis is not easy to measure and is very dependent on geography, experts claim.
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