Water Shortage In Brazil Essay

1428 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Survey About Water Scarcity

INTRODUCTION
One child dies every 90 seconds somewhere in the world due to no water or contaminated water. I was shocked to hear this statistic and decided to research the reasons why water, the main fuel for life on Earth is in short supply. Seventy percent of the world’s water is in the ocean. Out of the remaining water only 3% is drinkable and 1% is available for drinking. As Brazil has more water than any other country in the world. Amazing, despite having considerable water reserves, Brazil is experiencing water shortages. I have selected Afghanistan as a country that has the world’s worst water supply, mainly due to ongoing war that has destroyed the countries infrastructure for fresh water and sanitation. It is predicted that by 2050 there will not be adequate water supplies for the world population. …show more content…

There are around 201 million people in Brazil.
Sao Paulo is a city with 11 million people using 180 liters per person daily, or a total of 2 billion liters per day. A rate 50% higher than Germany. The city was not built to accommodate the current water requirements. Sao Paulo suffers from poor planning and failing infrastructure with the government falling behind in upgrades and maintenance of piped dams and transmission lines
40% of tap water is wasted due to leaky old pipes, fraud and illegal access. The government is working to fix the problems, which have been compounded by recent events of 2 dams at the iron ore mine cutting drinking water completely and contaminating water ways down stream with a toxic orange sediment that environmentalists fear could destroy the eco system long term
Environment minister Izabella Teixeira called it an “environmental catastrophe” and 9 people where killed in the

Show More
Related

  • Analysis Of Octavia E. Butler's Parable Of The Sower

    1359 Words  | 3 Pages

    Humans need water. In a world that is overpopulated, we use a lot of water and other natural resources. Currently, in our world, clean water is getting scarce. Recently, for example, Flint, Michigan, had a water crisis. In early 2016, the water was discovered to be tainted with lead and other toxins. Long before that, the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, and Governor Rick Snyder along with his council, knew about the lead, but to save money for the city of Flint in early 2014 Snyder had changed the city’s water source to the Flint River which had corroded pipes, causing people of all ages to be sick from the high amounts of lead

    Read More

  • Water Crisis in Peru

    546 Words  | 2 Pages

    In December of 1915 a huge step for the rights of Peasants in Peru was taken. Juan Pevez was born in Ica, Peru and in 1915 he lead an uprising against the Picasso family who ran the that Pevez worked on. In Water!, an excerpt from Pevez’s autobiography, a dispute over rights to water is described and how the peasants overcame . Southern Peru does not see much rain during the year, so when it does come it is an extremely valued commodity. In December 1915 a very unusual thing happened. The water came much earlier that year and to the peasant's surprise it went unnoticed by the estate owners. In that time the estate owners unlawfully kept the water from the peasants until their own fields were irrigated. The water came that year in the middle of the night so the estate owners were clueless. Unaware that they had the same rights to the water as the estate owners, the farmers were reluctant to open up the Sluice gates that allowed the water to enter their own small canals to irrigate their land. Juan Pevez, who was enrolled in the School of Agronomy informed the farmers that legally they had a right to the water. Trusting Pevez, they all opened their gates to irrigate their fields unbeknownst to the landowners. Soon, morning came and the “stolen” water was noticed and a brawl broke out between the serfs and the estate owners. After being broken up the peasants formed a delegation to make a plea to the Technical Commission to state their concern about the unfair distribution of water. The director of the commission, Ezequiel Gago, heard both sides argument. In December 1915 history was made when Gago ruled in favor of the Peasants. That was the first time in the history of the valley that a group of peasants won a case against a powerful landowner like Picasso.

    Read More

  • Developing Countries and Clean Water

    2664 Words  | 6 Pages

    Sickness there is common and many times, water is the cause. “Education is lost to sickness. Economic development is lost while people merely try to survive” (The World Project). Americans go to the sink knowing with a simple flip of the nosil, clean water will magically appear. It is often presumed that clean water is a given and it is never acknowledged that saving water in one country could evidently help another country's water... ...

    Read More

  • Essay On Colorado River

    891 Words  | 2 Pages

    “Don’t waste that water! Kids in Africa don’t even have water to drink!” Almost every American has heard this saying before. We have heard this because there are water shortages in third world countries like Africa, as seen in the movie “Blue Gold”. But why have we developed this notion that there are only water shortages in third world countries? When in reality, there is a shortage of water right here in our home country. The Colorado River’s water is high in demand as it serves millions of people, powers industries, and is home to all different kinds of wildlife. The Colorado River will not be able to keep up with the increasing demand of water and soon enough the river will go dry. Organizations like the Colorado River Water Users Association are trying to change the way that the water is used and adjust how it is managed. The Colorado River is drying up and the western states are running out of water, however, public policy is trying to regulate and preserve the Colorado River to make it more sustainable in the future.

    Read More

  • Water Scarcity in the USA

    985 Words  | 2 Pages

    Over the past fifty years, the U.S. population has doubled in size. During this time, total water usage per person has almost tripled. Since the end of World War II, there has been a steady increase of people moving out of rural areas and into cities. As a result, the domestic self-supplied population has greatly decreased and the need for public-water supply systems has intensified. These factors, in conjunction with certain economic trends, precipitation, and global climate changes, pose difficult challenges in the years to come.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Water Consumption In Perth And Western Australia

    2300 Words  | 5 Pages

    There is good reason for concern over water sustainability in Western Australia. Water is connected to all spheres of sustainability: environmental, social and economic. Using Systems Analysis to explore the reasons why water consumption is the way it is in WA, three key factors have emerged: a drying climate, affluence in WA, and community awareness and education. These three factors are interwoven, and they are influenced by one another. While consumption of water in Western Australia may be.. I’ll finish this later.

    Read More

  • Water Privatization: Private vs. Public

    963 Words  | 2 Pages

    Water has become a very controversial issue in the United States and around the world. As populations increase and resources decrease, the way we use our resources and keep populations safe become more and more important. Throughout the world there are nearly 1.1 billion people who do not have access the clean drinking water. 5 Most of these 1.1 billion people are located in poor areas and do not have the financial means to build the infrastructures needed to provide water to the citizens of their country. 5 Drinking water is an essential part of our everyday life. People must have water to survive, but it must be clean and safe to consume.

    Read More

  • Mexico City Water Shortage

    1575 Words  | 4 Pages

    Caused by climate change and urbanization, water shortages are a major concern of the Mexican government at both the local and federal level. Mexico City, the third largest city in the world with more than twenty million inhabitants, struggles with water scarcity because of the potential risk it poses to the wellbeing of its citizens. Similar to the situation in other megacities, such as Jakarta and Bangkok, Mexico City’s water supplies are being depleted because of a growing urban population. (CBC News , 2009 ) Unable to sufficiently supply the increasing population size of the city, the water in the Mexico Valley aquifer is being drawn out faster than the aquifer’s recharge rate. Exacerbated by the fragmented nature of Mexico’s political culture, the exploitation of Mexico City’s water resources due to a growing urban population is detrimentally degrading the environment and creating a self-perpetuating problem that places the city and its inhabitants at risk.

    Read More

  • The Water Shortage in Mexico

    989 Words  | 2 Pages

    Mexico is high-urbanized country. Almost 78% of its citizens live in cities (Castro and Heller 2009). That is why citizens of urban areas suffer the most from the appreciable water shortage. The situation with water supply in urban areas is critical. As an example, Mexico City, with population about 20 million people, faces quite serious scarcity of water. It obtains water from 3 main basins, all of them are overexploited (UNESCO 2006). The solution of the government to this problem was to pump water from the aquifers. However, these palliative actions of the government have not solved the problem, three aquifers from which city gets water are overused (UNESCO 2006).

    Read More

  • Rights to Water

    1231 Words  | 3 Pages

    This is because only a small part of the population, particularly in developing countries, have access to water of acceptable quality. It is estimated that in some countries only 20% of the rural population has water of satisfactory quality. Based on these statistics, it is clear the urgent need for awareness about caring for water use. Almost without realizing it, we are seriously jeopardizing this essential resource, not for us but for our children's children and their generations, aware that in other parts o...

    Read More

  • Essay On Brazil Geography

    577 Words  | 2 Pages

    Brazil, with a total area of 3,287,612 square miles, is the fifth largest country in the world, and the third largest country in the Western Hemisphere. It is also the fifth largest country according to population. Water makes up 21,411 square miles of the total area. Brazil is the largest country in South America, making up almost half (47%) of the land mass of the continent. Brazil has over 4,654 miles of coastline, all of it bordering on the Atlantic Ocean. Brazil contains most of the Amazon River, which is the world’s second longest at over 4,040 miles long. It is the “world’s largest river in volume and contains one-fifth of all the fresh water” on the planet (“Geography of Brazil”). Furthermore, the Amazon rainforest that encompasses the area around the river is the largest rainforest in the world, and is estimated to contain about one-third of the planet’s known animal species (“Brazil Geography Introduction”). The Amazon rainforest makes up almost half of the world’s rainforests all by itself. An interesting note about the Brazilian geography: Brazil shares common boundaries ...

    Read More

  • The Global Water Crisis

    2639 Words  | 6 Pages

    Freshwater in the world makes up only a small portion of water on the planet. While the percentage of water in the world is nearly 70%, only 2.5% is consumable. Even further, only <1% is easily accessible to basic human needs. According to National Geographic, “by 2025, an estimated 1.8 billion people will live in areas plagued by water scarcity, with two-thirds of the world's population living in water-stressed regions as a result of use, growth, and climate change.” With this current trend, water will become more immersed in environmental, economic, political, and social changes. Many of these in later years shall need to be addressed as tension rises:

    Read More

  • The Water Crisis and Solutions

    1481 Words  | 3 Pages

    Freshwater is quite scarce, but it is even scarcer than one might think: about seventy percent of all freshwater is frozen in the icecaps of Antarctica and Greenland and is unavailable to humans. Most of the remainder is present as soil moisture or lies in deep underground aquifers as groundwater. It is not economically feasible to extract this waster for use as drinking water. This leaves less than one percent of the world’s fresh water that is available to humans. It includes the water found in lakes, reservoirs, groundwater that is shallow enough to be tapped at an affordable cost. These freshwater sources are the only sources that are frequently replenished by rain and snowfall, and therefore are renewable. At the current rates of consumption, however, this supply of fresh water will not last. Pollution and contamination of freshwater sources exacerbate the problem, further reducing the amount of freshwater available for human consumption. Something must be done if humans want to even survive in the near future: the lack of clean drinking water is already the number one cause of disease in the world today. The first step is worldwide awareness of the water crisis: governments and the citizens they govern worldwide need to know about this problem and be actively involved in solving this problem.

    Read More

  • The Problem of Water Scarcity

    1538 Words  | 4 Pages

    Water scarcity is harmful to human life because when water is poorly managed throughout the world, those who need water are deprived of nutrients they truly need, causing them to die. This eventually affects the global population. Therefore, many experts have proposed several solutions such as the LifeSaver Bottle, TrojanUVPhox treatment system, and Waste Water Recycling. The problem of water scarcity has increasingly spread throughout the world as of yet, The UN reports that within the next half- century up to 7 billion people in 60 countries which is more than the whole present population will face water scarcity (Sawin “Water Scarcity could Overwhelm the Next Generation”). As well, the demand for freshwater has tripled over the past 50 years, and is continuing to rise as a result of population growth and economic development.

    Read More

  • Water Scarcity and Possible Solutions

    1100 Words  | 3 Pages

    “Water is the lifeblood of this planet. Every time a good is bought or sold there is a virtual exchange of water. Every time we interact with water, we change it, redirect it, or otherwise alter its state. We have never learned how to efficiently manage water.”(Cluckie, 2009) Ian Cluckie, Professor of Hydrology and Water Management, emphasizes the fact that humans can’t survive without water. Although water is a renewable resource that can replenish under hydrological cycles, our intervention has interrupted its natural cycle causing its supply to decrease.(Cluckie, 2009)

    Read More

More about Water Shortage In Brazil Essay

Open Document