3.3.4. Water stress in Small Island Developing States
FACT BOX According to the United Nations Office of the High Representative for the Least Developed Countries, Landlocked Developing Countries and Small Island Developing States, Small Island Developing States (SIDS) tend to face similar constraints in their sustainable development efforts, such as a narrow resource base depriving them of the benefits of economies of scale; small domestic markets and heavy dependence on few external and remote markets; high costs for energy, infrastructure, transportation, communication and services; long distances from export markets and import resources; low and irregular international traffic volumes; little resilience to natural disasters; growing populations; high volatility of economic growth; limited opportunities for the private sector and a proportionately large reliance of their economies on their public sector; and fragile natural environments. These factors make SIDS particularly vulnerable to biodiversity loss and climate change because they lack economic alternatives. Source: United Nations Office of the High Representative for the Least Developed Countries, Landlocked Developing Countries and Small Island Developing States (2021).
For this report, information to compute indicator 6.4.2 was only available in less than 50 percent of SIDS (Figure 12). This is the result of the fact
3.4. Level of water stress at major river basin level
that – as previously mentioned – in many cases,
Following the thresholds established for this
EFR values are not available in SIDS. This, in turn,
indicator (see section 2.2), major river basins
is due to the limitations of the GEFIS system
with an indicator level lower than 25 percent
used to estimate environmental flows, which
have no water stress. Those basins with a water
does not allow the assessment of the parameter
stress level greater than 75 percent have high
in very small areas.
or critical water stress. High values of water stress mean more water users are competing
Water stress in SIDS is generally very low, with
for limited water supplies. As shown in Figure
exceptions such as Barbados and the Dominican
13, water stress is evident in all the basins
Republic whose main water use is related to
characterized by intensely irrigated agriculture,
agriculture, and Singapore, whose main water
as well as in those including densely populated
use is urban supply.
cities (for example, Cape Town) which compete with the agriculture sector for the use of water,
In large archipelagos such as Fiji, variables such
and where there is less volume of available
as climate, water availability and population
freshwater resources due to climatic conditions.
density are very heterogeneous. Further
Overall, the results shown in Figure 13 are
disaggregation of the indicator will be necessary
aligned with what is shown in the map of water
to capture a more accurate value of water stress
stress at country level (Figure 7).
in those situations.
PROGRESS ON LEVEL OF WATER STRESS - 2021
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