{"id":450279,"date":"2010-03-19T17:37:54","date_gmt":"2010-03-19T21:37:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.earthportal.org\/news\/?p=3217"},"modified":"2010-03-19T17:37:54","modified_gmt":"2010-03-19T21:37:54","slug":"water-scarcity-becoming-a-critical-issue-for-the-arab-world-%e2%80%93-un-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/450279","title":{"rendered":"Water scarcity becoming a critical issue for the Arab world \u2013 UN report"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.un.org\/apps\/news\/story.asp?NewsID=34096&amp;Cr=drought&amp;Cr1\" >United Nations News Centre:<\/a> Climate change,  food insecurity, decreasing water availability and unemployment are  among the multiple challenges facing the Arab region, according to a new  assessment by the United Nations Environment Programme (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.unep.org\/Documents.Multilingual\/Default.asp?DocumentID=617&amp;ArticleID=6500&amp;l=en\">UNEP<\/a>)  which calls for rational and sustainable use of resources and inclusion  of the environment issues in decision making.  \u201cThis assessment has been a truly collaborative one outlining the  progress but also the realities facing this diverse but also dynamic  region where, if policies and resources are better focused could be a  beacon of sustainable, green economic, development for millions of  people,\u201d said Achim Steiner, Under-Secretary-General and UNEP Executive  Director.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.un.org\/apps\/news\/story.asp?NewsID=34096&amp;Cr=drought&amp;Cr1\" ><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.un.org\/News\/dh\/photos\/2009\/21-01-2009water.jpg\" align=\"left\" width=\"190\" height=\"128\" \/><\/a>According to the report, Arab countries are now among the most  water-scarce in the world with a \u201cworrying decline in per capita water  availability,\u201d likely to be aggravated by climate change.<\/p>\n<p>Poverty remains a challenge in most countries in the region and  unemployment is widespread at 13.7 per cent \u2013 more than twice the global  average, according to latest estimates.<\/p>\n<p>The report says the Arab region is predicted to be among the hardest hit  by the potential of direct and indirect impacts linked with climate  change.<\/p>\n<p>Impacts include loss of coastal zones, more severe droughts and  desertification, increased groundwater salinity, and a surge in  epidemics and infectious diseases.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThus it is in the interests of nations across the region to  constructively engage in the climate change negotiations as countries  look to Mexico and the UN climate convention meeting later in the year,\u201d  said Mr. Steiner, noting that Cancun will host the UN Climate Change  Conference (COP16) at the end of November.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.un.org\/apps\/news\/story.asp?NewsID=34096&amp;Cr=drought&amp;Cr1\" >Read more&gt;&gt; <\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"akst_link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.earthportal.org\/news\/?p=3217&amp;akst_action=share-this\"  title=\"E-mail this, post to del.icio.us, etc.\" id=\"akst_link_3217\" class=\"akst_share_link\" rel=\"nofollow\">Share This<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>United Nations News Centre: Climate change, food insecurity, decreasing water availability and unemployment are among the multiple challenges facing the Arab region, according to a new assessment by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) which calls for rational and sustainable use of resources and inclusion of the environment issues in decision making. \u201cThis assessment has [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-450279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=450279"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450279\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=450279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=450279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=450279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}