The waters of the Tigris and the Euphrates, the arteries of the great Mesopotamian plain, have significantly deteriorated in quantity and quality over the last few decades. Due to multiple factors, chief of which are the water projects of upstream countries, the mass dumping of pollutants and the infiltration of the aforementioned into the two rivers, the persistence of ancient, inefficient methods of irrigation, and the generally sub-optimal management of water resources, Iraq suffers increasingly severe water stress, progressively exacerbated by climate change.
The American University of Iraq-Baghdad (AUIB), in its commitment to continuously stive for empowering Iraq to better address the many challenges it faces, by playing a key role in the development and dissemination of knowledge that is most relevant to problem-solving, organized a conference, in partnership with the World Bank, under the title, “Water for the Future: From Scarcity to Sustainability.” Most prominent among the attendees were concerned Iraqi government officials, diplomats, representatives of international agencies such as the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), Professors from prominent universities such as Exeter of the UK, experts in the field, and representatives of various INGOs.
“We cannot just blame Iraq’s neighbors for everything when Iraq can better use the water it has, conserve its aquifers and use and reuse water better through smarter irrigation and recycling, utilizing new technologies and methods,” said AUIB President, Dr. Michael Mulnix, in his opening speech, making clear that “the objective of this conference is to offer scientific solutions to mitigate water scarcity and the impact of climate change, and to support Iraq in planning and overcoming these factors that are severely limiting to social and economic development.”
“A hundred years ago, Iraq started building modern water projects and flood-control systems,” however, things changed as of the 1970s when Iraq’s challenge was no longer floods, but water scarcity, as upstream countries started building large dams and irrigation projects, beginning with the Turkish South-East Anatolia Project (GAP), leading to the deterioration of water coming into Iraq, in terms of both quantity and quality, explained Deputy Minister of Water Resources for Technical Affairs, Eng. Hussein Abdul-Amir, who pointed out, in the same context, to Iran’s diversion of numerous rivers and tributaries away from Iraq, naming among those the Diala and the Qaroun. He also pointed out that previous agreements with riparian states had never developed into permanent agreements that specify the water quotas of each of those states. “The continuation of the (abovementioned) projects, unilaterally, puts Iraq in a difficult position,” especially with “climate change that has become more tangible in the past few years,” added the Deputy Minister, saying that the present situation necessitates, firstly, “formulating a strategy for broad reforms to achieve the optimal use of water,” and secondly, striving to strike permanent agreements on the sharing of waters among riparian states, and to impose “fair and reasonable use (of water), that does not inflict heavy damage” onto downstream states.