Context: In its new report entitled "The State of Climate Services 2021: Water," World Meteorological Organization (WMO), a specialised agency of the United Nations (UN), has warned that climate change increases the global risk of water-related hazards like floods and droughts and the number of people affected by water scarcity is also expected to soar.
Key highlights

• Water-related hazards like floods and droughts are increasing because of climate change.
• As per the report, 3.6 billion people had inadequate access to water at least one month per year in 2018. By 2050, this is expected to rise to more than five billion.
• In the past 20 years, terrestrial water storage (TWS) has dropped at a rate of 1cm per year. The biggest losses are occurring in Antarctica and Greenland, but many highly populated lower latitude locations are experiencing significant water losses.
• TWS is the summation of all water on the land surface and in the subsurface, including soil moisture, snow and ice.
• Only 0.5% of water on Earth is useable and available freshwater.
• Water-related hazards have increased in frequency over the past 20 years. Since 2000, flood-related disasters have risen by 134% compared with the two previous decades.
• Most of the flood-related deaths and economic losses were recorded in Asia, where end-to-end warning systems for riverine floods require strengthening.
• Number and duration of droughts also increased by 29% over this same period. Most drought-related deaths occurred in Africa.

Key concerns
A WMO assessment of 101 countries for which data are available found that:

• There is inadequate interaction among climate services providers and information users in 43% of WMO Members;
• Data is not collected for basic hydrological variables in approximately 40% of them;
• Hydrological data is not made available in 67% of them;
• End-to-end riverine flood forecasting and warning systems are absent or inadequate in 34% of those who provided data;
• End-to-end drought forecasting and warning systems are lacking or inadequate in 54% of them.
• Despite a 9% increase in financial pledges made to tackle SDG 6, official development assistance (ODA) commitments remained stable at US$ 8.8 billion between 2015 and 2019.

The world is seriously behind schedule on the UN Sustainable Development Goal No. 6.

• Note: (SDG 6) aims to ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all.

Invest and Improve

• The report calls for improving water management, integrating water and climate policies, and scaling up investment as current measures are fragmented and inadequate.
• Recommendations include investing in integrated resources water management to better manage water stress, especially in Small Island Developing States (SIDS) and the world’s Least Developed Countries (LDCs).
• Authorities in the LDCs are particularly urged to invest in early warning systems for droughts and floods.
• Countries are also encouraged to fill gaps related to data collection critical to climate services and early warning systems, and to join the Water and Climate Coalition, a WMO initiative that provides support, including in improving assessment of water resources.

By: Shubham Tiwari