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Opinion

Handling water footprints

As an imminent water crisis haunts the world, India should make no delay in chalking out a long-term policy for managing its water resources

Handling water footprints
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India is not a water-rich country even though it is portrayed so in various writings. With only a four per cent share of global freshwater, India feeds 18 per cent of the world population. Moreover, India is one of the largest exporters of groundwater. Water availability per person in India has reduced over the years. The average annual per capita water availability in 2001 and 2011 was assessed to be 1,816 cubic metres and 1,545 cubic metres respectively, which may further reduce to 1,486 cubic metres in the year 2021, reported Business Standard.

The World Meteorological Organisation, in their report, State of Climate Services, 2021, states that globally, the number of people with inadequate access to water is expected to rise to more than five billion by 2050 — up from 3.6 billion in 2018. As per CBS News, despite some progress in recent years, the report found that based on current rates of advancement, 107 countries would not meet goals to sustainably manage water supplies and access by 2030.

Recently, during his address to the global leaders at the climate summit (CoP26), India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said that India's per capita carbon footprint was 60 per cent lower than the global average. But he was silent on the water footprint of India. Maybe because India has not put serious efforts to calculate the per capita and national water footprint of the country.

Like oil, water is a very important strategic resource. National and per capita water footprints would be very important issues in near future — the way carbon footprint has emerged as a strategic bargaining issue in international trade and climate negotiations. This piece will try to address a few important aspects of this important strategic and economic commodity.

Economics of water footprints

Economists have defined water footprint as the sum of the volume of freshwater used to produce a product along its supply chain. In 2019, the global average water footprint was 1,240 cubic metres/per capita/per year, and the corresponding figures for India, China, and the USA were 1,089; 1,071 and 2,842 respectively. The Water Footprint Network maintains a global database on the water footprint of products.

To analyse the economics of water, we have to first understand different classifications of freshwater which comprises three different categories — the green, blue and grey waters. Green water is the water transpired by the plant that comes from rainwater stored in soil. Blue water is the water in our surface and groundwater reservoirs. In irrigated agriculture, blue water is abstracted to maintain transpiration. Grey water is the water that becomes polluted during production, say in agriculture, because of the leaching of nutrients and pesticides. Purification of grey water is a fast-growing water servicing industry.

This categorisation of water footprint into green, blue and grey (recall the categorisation of agricultural subsidies into green box, blue box and amber box under the WTO Agreement on Agriculture) depending on its source and level of purification may create trade disputes. It has the potential to be used/misused as an environmental trade barrier (ETB) in near future. Issues like 'water labels' and 'water tax' (on the basis of 'non-green water footprint' of the goods and commodities exported) would be imposed to create barriers to trade. Higher the non-green water content, higher would be the water tax at the entry point. Countries like India which export huge quantities of water-intensive food items like rice, beef, sugar etc might be worst hit by any such move.

Chapagain and Hoekstra (2011) estimated in that year the global water footprint of rice production was 784 km3/year with an average of 1,325 m3/tonne, which was 48 per cent green, 44 per cent blue, and 8 per cent grey. A study by Harris et al (2020) estimated that 40 per cent (94 million tonnes) of the total cereal food supply was traded among Indian states in 2011-12. That corresponded to trade of 54.0 km3 of embedded blue water and 99.4 km3 of embedded green water. The study also revealed that of the cereals traded within India in 2011-12, 41 per cent were produced in states with over-exploited groundwater reserves and a further 21 per cent in states with critically depleting groundwater reserves

Managing water footprints

Agriculture consumes over 70 per cent of freshwater. Substantial changes in agricultural practices and land use may be required to secure future production, trade, and availability of cereals in India. In FY 21, India is expected to export USD 8.8 billion worth of rice. It may be mentioned that India's rice productivity is less than half of China's, yet the country's water footprint of rice is nearly double.

To manage and minimise water footprints, the focus should be on increased productivity and minimum use of blue water for cultivation. For example, water-intensive rice cultivation should be encouraged using green water of coastal and eastern India instead of water-stressed Punjab and Haryana. Similarly, sugar cane cultivation should be discouraged using blue water of Maharashtra and western Uttar Pradesh and be grown in eastern India — where it was mostly cultivated earlier. The place Gour (once the capital of Bengal) got its name from gur (molasses) which was abundantly produced in that region.

Water economist AY Hoekstra (2013) had made a few concrete suggestions to manage India's water footprint: (i) The government should put a water footprint cap for each separate catchment in order to ensure sustainable water use at the river basin level. A water footprint cap sets a maximum to the water volume that can be allocated to various human purposes, accounting for environmental water needs. The total volume of 'water footprint permits' to specific users in a basin should remain below the maximum sustainable level. (ii) Government and major stakeholders together need to establish water footprint benchmarks for the most important water-intensive products like food and beverages, cotton, and biofuels. The benchmark for a product will depend on the maximum reasonable water consumption in each step of the product's supply chain.

Apprehensions

If water tax and maximum green water requirements are made mandatory by the major importers of the developed countries, it is very likely that cultivation practices will change. Food products meant for export markets will be cultivated with green water and those meant for domestic market cultivation will be done with blue and contaminated grey water. Millions of hungry Indians will be fed with blue (indigo) food which will make them Nilkantha, the blue necked mythical God, who saved the world by swallowing all earthly poison! Developed countries of the North have already polluted the pristine air of the developing South by transferring their dirty polluting industries to carbon havens like India and China. They have become green at the expense of masses of the South who are turning blue by swallowing their poison.

India does not have a proper water policy. As water is becoming increasingly scarce, its economic and strategic value is rising. Considering its importance, India should have a long-term water policy, aiming at minimising the use of blue water which should be preserved for the future generation, and to maintain ecological balance.

Views expressed are personal

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