90 percent of the world’s water is sea water and only 0.4 percent of the water in the world can be used as a clean water. Water demand is increasing as the result of population growth in particular and other causes such as urbanisation, expansion of agriculture and industries.
The natural water resources are limited in quantity and if the usage is not managed properly, water shortage has to be faced in the very near future. The availability of water in both quantity and quality is being severely affected by climate variability and climate change and these are caused by both natural and man-made events. As a result flood and drought occurs that increase vulnerability of people and stress on the water resources.
IWRM means that all the different uses of water resources are managed together and the management functions of IWRM are water allocation, pollution control, monitoring, financial management, flood and drought management, information management and basin planning. These are some of the key messages in the book, which will be distributed from grass root level up to various stakeholders, in a bid to raise awareness about water management and water security under the scope of IWRM.
