BLOG
The Thirsty Dragon: China’s Water Challenge – Implications for the U.S. Rebalance to Asia
July 25th, 2013
Via Council on Foreign Relations, a report on Elizabeth C. Economy’s testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs, discussing China’s water scarcity challenge and its potential to destabilize the region: How China manages its water resources over the next five to seven years has profound implications not only for […]
Read more »Hydropower Dams On The Mekong: Old Dreams, New Dangers
July 24th, 2013
Courtesy of Asia Policy’s July 2013 issue, a detailed look by Richard Cronin at Mekong River basin: Today, the Mekong River Basin is on the edge of a two-pronged calamity as a result of both the long-term and near-term actions of humans and governments. Of the two, short-term actions such as deforestation, the unsustainable consumption […]
Read more »How Yemen Chewed Itself Dry
July 24th, 2013
Via Foreign Affairs, an interesting report on Yemen’s water crisis: In a little over a decade, Sana’a, Yemen, may become the world’s first capital to run out of water. Failed governance and environmental mismanagement share some of the blame for drying up the city. But there is also a more surprising culprit: a national addiction […]
Read more »Himalayan Water Security: A South Asian Perspective
July 23rd, 2013
Via the July 2013 issue of Asia Policy, a look at South Asia’s perception of Himalayan water security: South Asia has emerged during recent decades as a major theater of tension and conflict around shared rivers. The region is made up of predominantly rural, poor, and agrarian societies. While in recent years India has been […]
Read more »Melting The Geopolitical Ice In South Asia
July 23rd, 2013
Via the July 2013 issue of Asia Policy, an interesting article by Robert Wirsing: No one doubts that the six mainland states of the South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation (SAARC)—Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, and Pakistan—harbor an abundance of varied water-resource problems, with a steadily mounting scarcity of freshwater ranking high among them. Because […]
Read more »Pakistan’s New Big Threat Isn’t Terrorism—It’s Water
July 23rd, 2013
Via The Atlantic, an article on how shortages of water threaten to destabilize south Asia even further: In a report released last week by the Asian Development Bank (ADB), Pakistan was pinpointed as “one of the most water-stressed countries in the world, not far from being classified, ‘water-scarce’.” As water demand exceeds supply in the […]
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