Adaptation, Climate Change, Agriculture, and Water

Water already has scarcity value in many watersheds. Seventeen countries currently withdraw more than half of their available renewable water supply (FAO, 2016). Continued population and GDP growth will only increase future water demand and raise the scarcity value of water. Managing water more efficiently is already a pressing issue in semi-arid regions and will be ever more important in the future. Climate change is likely to make this problem worse. Higher future temperatures will increase evaporation lowering water supply and also increase the demand for water for irrigation, cooling, and other uses (IPCC, 2014). If society fails to adapt to this challenge, some analysts argue that there will be large damages from future water scarcity (Titus, 1992).