International Launch of WBGU Flagship Report “Water in a heated world”

In a climatically and geopolitically heated world, water challenges are intensifying. The WBGU (German Advisory Council on Global Change) flagship report “Water in a Heated World” which was launched international online on 24 January, takes an in-depth look at this issue.

Cover: WBGU’s recent flagship report “Water in a Heated World”

WBGU’s recent flagship report “Water in a Heated World”

The webinar opened with a presentation of the report by Prof Jörg Drewes, Co-Chair of the WBGU. Subsequently, Prof. Anna-Katharina Hornidge (Co-Chair of the WBGU) joined Prof. Akica Bahri, Former Minister of Water Resources, Tunisia; Prof. Martina Angela Caretta, Lund University, Coordinating Lead Author of the 6th IPCC Assessment Report (2022); and Prof. Kalanithy Vairavamoorthy, Executive Director, International Water Association, London, in a panel discussion moderated by Maike Voss, Head of Neues Handeln Berlin/Cologne. The panel focussed on debating the key messages of the report.

National and international water policy must adapt to accelerated changes in the global water cycle. Water emergencies beyond the scope of previous experience are becoming more frequent worldwide. The effects of climate change, the overexploitation of water resources, the unequal distribution of water, the loss of ecosystem services, growing widespread pollution and related health risks are increasingly resulting in these regional water emergencies. This development is characterised by a loss of stationarity and therefore increasing planning uncertainty, which in extreme cases leads to situations that are beyond the limits of controllability. They can lead to the destabilisation of political, societal and ecological systems. Climate-change mitigation, the protection of ecosystems and a climate-resilient, socially balanced water management are the most important measures for preventing water emergencies.

Anna-Katharina Hornidge focussed in her contribution on the UN Water Process, as well as the role of plurilateral settings for carrying the water agenda forward. She particularly reflected on the decisions taken over the past years with regard to water on the levels of G7 and G20. Further, she stressed the importance of a proactive state, while at the same time fostering and enabling bottom-up water governance, along the Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystems Nexus. With regard to the increasing geopolitisation of international relations and cooperation, represented also by the recent inauguration of Donald Trump as 47th president of the USA, she underlined the importance of policy fields such as ‘water governance’. Because of their technical and infrastructural nature, these fields, which are of foundational importance for many societies, can be depoliticised, allowing for international cooperation also despite potential differences in other areas.

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