When the Rivers Run Dry: Water--The Defining Crisis of the Twenty-First Century
Fred Pearce
Author
June 10, 2006
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Throughout history, rivers have been our foremost source of fresh water both for
agriculture and for individual consumption, but now economists say that
by 2025 water scarcity will cut global food production by more than the
current U.S. grain harvest. In this groundbreaking book, veteran science
correspondent Fred Pearce focuses on the dire state of the world's
rivers to provide our most complete portrait yet of the growing world
water crisis and its ramifications for us all.
Pearce traveled to more than thirty countries while researching When the
Rivers Run Dry, examining the current state of crucial water sources
like the Indus River in Pakistan, the Colorado River in the United
States, and the Yellow and Yangzte rivers in China. Pearce deftly weaves
together the complicated scientific, economic, and historic dimensions
of the water crisis, showing us its complex origins-from waste to
wrong-headed engineering projects to high-yield crop varieties that have
saved developing countries from starvation but are now emptying their
water reserves. He reveals the most daunting water issues we face today,
among them the threat of flooding in China's Yellow River, where rising
silt levels will prevent dykes from containing floodwaters; the
impoverishment of Pakistan's Sindh, a once-fertile farming valley now
destroyed by the 14 million tons of salt that the much-depleted Indus
deposits annually on the land but cannot remove; the disappearing
Colorado River, whose reservoirs were once the lifeblood of seven states
but which could dry up as soon as 2007; and the poisoned springs of
Palestine and the Jordan River, where Israeli control of the water
supply has only fed conflict between Israelis and Palestinians.
The situation is dire, but not without remedy. Pearce argues that the solution to the growing worldwide water shortage is not more and bigger dams but greater efficiency and a new water ethic based on managing the water cycle for maximum social benefit rather than narrow self-interest.
Fred Pearce has been writing about water issues for over twenty years. A former news editor at New Scientist and currently its environment and development consultant, he has also written for Audubon, Popular Science, Time, the Boston Globe, and Natural History. His books include Keepers of the Spring, Turning Up the Heat, and Deep Jungle.
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