The theme for World Food Day (October 16) this year — ‘Water is Life, Water is Food’ — calls for urgent action in managing water wisely. Availability or a lack of water has become even more critical with increasing climate extremes. Countries face severe challenges such as drought, floods, unseasonal rains and prolonged dry spells. With less than seven years left to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) — the UN’s food agencies — lay stress on the need to adopt innovative and collaborative approaches for improved management, conservation and availability of scarce water resources.
Water availability affects every aspect of human life, especially food and nutrition security. For instance, about 60% of India’s net sown area is rainfed, contributing to 40% of the total food production. However, rainfed agriculture depends directly on water availability, and rain and soil moisture variations can severely affect food and nutrition security. There is an urgent need to adapt to climate change by promoting technologies and practices that make rainfed production more resilient and sustainable. Sustainable water management is critical to address the impending food and nutrition security threats. In turn, irrigated agriculture accounts for 72% of global freshwater withdrawals, sometimes with lasting damaging effects on the sustainability of significant ecosystems, such as seasonal rivers and deep aquifers.
