Managing water resources and solving their problems requires collective wisdom and reason

According to IRNA on Thursday from the Ministry of Energy, the water crisis in recent years, which has left more negative effects due to climate change, requires urgent and effective solutions, which will undoubtedly result only in commemoration of a specific day or a predetermined period. It will not bear fruit.

At the same time, the potential risks to the security of drinking, agricultural, industrial, and food water, and the understanding of current realities about water resources and the management of these sectors, also compel water stakeholders not to accept any delays or delays in overcoming the problems ahead.

National Water Day is a good answer to these concerns, but it does not necessarily have a permanent, all-time functional role.

Sustainable and permanent management of water resources, which at the same time guarantees the solution of problems in this field, requires common sense and wisdom.

Water is the problem of our country today, and naturally a manager or an organization and institution alone will not be able to achieve it. However, the National Water Day can be a platform for handing over all these factors to achieve the main goal, which is to establish water security in our country.

Drinking water management, agriculture and water needs of food industries have become a very serious concept in the agenda of the authorities and policymakers in the world, and this approach has been taken for a long time not only in water-scarce climates, but also in water-rich regions and lands. They have taken it seriously and are working towards its full realization.

In our country, the two issues of water scarcity and non-observance of consumption patterns are raised side by side and are not separate categories.

Moving away from these two problems and getting a positive result from each of the two headings is related to the other. Therefore, the improvement of water consumption pattern can not be separated from the inventory of water resources.

Some experts in this field believe that the main reasons for the water crisis in Iran are high climatic diversity, inadequate water distribution and prioritization of economic development.

Thus, lack of proper planning, poor management, heterogeneous development, erroneous water allocation policies as well as inadequate pricing, farmers’ inability to optimize irrigation, wasteful use of industry and many other causes go hand in hand and shorten the water crisis. they do.

The problem is clear; Iran is facing serious water problems on a local and national scale.

In this regard, the unbalanced increase in demand and the lack of response to this need along with the reduction of water resources can be considered as factors to complicate this crisis and of course to get out of such a problem, all capacities must be used in a national effort. Let’s not face the catastrophe of dehydration.

For example, one of these topics is ignoring the correct consumption pattern in the home sector.

People have not been expected to make the necessary savings in water consumption, given that no well-planned planning has been designed for this issue in recent years, or for any reason water management policies have not been successful. Accordingly, largely uncertain decisions and the lack of water supply infrastructure in the domestic sector are having their negative effects, as they have so far. Also, the increasing consumption of the home sector, along with the growth of unjustified demand in industry and agriculture, brings us closer to all kinds of problems.

This wide range is sounding the alarm of dehydration while not having learned a good lesson from their previous trials and errors in both management and consumption.

In other words, the experiences gained in optimizing water consumption have not been used as they should be. At present, the share of water consumption in the agricultural sector is close to 90%, drinking 8% and industry and mining 2%, while in the developed regions of the world, these shares are 30, 11 and 59%, respectively.

According to published statistics, the rainfall situation in our country is heterogeneous, so that one percent of the area of ​​Iran has more than 1 thousand millimeters of rainfall and the amount of rainfall in areas such as the eastern catchment is about 148 millimeters. In general, water is used in three sectors: agriculture, drinking and industry.

Of the 17 countries in the world in terms of water crisis, 12 are said to be located in the Middle East and North Africa, which includes all the countries of the Persian Gulf.

On the other hand, we must acknowledge that Iran and neighboring Arab countries must use all of each other’s experiences to meet this challenge in order to achieve particular success in improving water security and reducing damage to the Persian Gulf ecology. That is, solving the water problem in Iran is not limited to internal planning and management.

One way out of such a situation is to desalinate the water of the Persian Gulf so that the provinces and cities that have high water stress, with this approach, at least in agriculture and industry, to avoid water insecurity.

At the same time, at least with this general behavior and policy, the use of fresh water helps to preserve valuable groundwater resources and can be saved for the use of local rural communities and prevent further migration of rural population to cities.

One of the unfortunate problems caused by water stress is the conflicts that arise in rural communities and indigenous communities, confronting law enforcement agencies and making people more bitter. This challenge comes at a time when we realize that such differences are only due to political affiliations between the factions.

So it is natural to think that events such as the National Water Day can bring about a favorable consensus and lead the individual to the community to resolve the crisis and create the desire to leverage the unification of individuals, groups and policy-making institutions. Consider it strong.

To solve water problems, the principle of social participation must be considered; This category is the basis and driving force of social capital.

It has been said many times before that Iran’s ability to deal with the water crisis is also linked to its foreign policy challenges. Given that the water crisis in Iran is not only due to the ongoing droughts of recent years, but also issues such as sanctions against Iran by foreign hegemonic powers, we will find that we must implement the desired developments in the field of political relations. .

Undoubtedly, the imposition of severe sanctions by the United States, along with internal management weaknesses, is fueling the fire of the water crisis and ultimately adding a knot to our other economic knots.

Solving current water problems becomes impossible without a multidimensional view and without creating general coordination and intervention of elements and stakeholders, and it is in such circumstances that we realize that National Water Day can be a permanent vehicle for overcoming the water crisis. In fact, it should be taken seriously that every day of the year should be National Water Day.

With education and culture, water consumption and lifestyle can be changed. This change requires education and culture building that starts with the individual and ends with the supply chain of the responsible institutions. This policy has been implemented in parts of countries such as Australia, India and parts of the southwestern United States and has yielded favorable results, and accordingly, such an approach has spread to other parts of the world and has led to a very favorable control of water stress. Using the experiences of this policy can be adapted to the local, indigenous and climatic conditions of our country and accelerate the solution of the problem.

Fortunately, at this point in time, the issue of overcoming the water crisis has been on the agenda of the institutions in charge of water. The recent proposal of the Minister of Energy, Ali Akbar Mehrabian, to establish a think tank between the Ministries of Energy and Science, Research and Technology with the aim of continuous communication between industry and academia, is an example of this claim.

The fact that the Ministry of Energy is more focused on resolving the water crisis can have very positive consequences. In particular, general and comprehensive social participation should be placed next to this vision, and everyone should consider themselves responsible for resolving the water crisis, and once and for all, put aside divisions or separate island practices and know that every day can be National Water Day. Be. Of course, it goes without saying that March 4 has not yet been approved by the Public Culture Council as National Water Day.