'World to face acute shortage of water and food in 2025'

Forty percent of the world population is facing shortage of water, which will take a serious turn with acute shortage of water and food in 2025, said Professor Dr Bashir Ahmad, Vice Chancellor University of Agriculture Faisalabad (UAF). He was addressing a function attended by Dr Schwartz, Chairman Department of Livestock Ecology, University of Humboldt Berlin (Germany) here on Monday.
He said that fresh water reserves were fast depleting due to over population and other environmental and ecological changes.
"The gap between the demand and availability of water will soar to 50 percent in 2025," he added. "Being agrarian economy, 67 percent of population in Pakistan was dependent on agriculture," he said and added that access to fresh water was imperative to overcome the challenge of poverty.
Underlining the importance of water for crops and livestock, he said that 3,000-liter water was required to produce only one-kilogram rice. Similarly, 100,000-litre water was needed to produce only 1 kilogram of meat, he said and stressed the need to ensure the adequate supply of water to produce various crops and livestock for human consumption.
POLLUTED PONDS: Dr Schwartz in his keynote lecture said that livestock was facing a major setback because of the polluted ponds in the rural areas of Pakistan. "The demand of water for livestock will record an unprecedented increase of 72 percent within next 25 years," he said and stressed the need for appropriate measures and strategies to meet this demand.
Presenting various statistics, he said that 250-kilogram water was required to produce only one kilogram of grass, while 11-kilogram grass was needed to produce one kilogram of meat. He said that time has come to conserve water not only for the crops but also for the livestock to meet the needs of our fast growing population.
Dr Riaz Hussain Qureshi, Adviser Higher Education Commission, said that the present government was fully concentrating on the higher education and in this connection, funds have been increased from Rs 800 million to Rs 15 billion.
Dr Phill Hollington, co-ordinator Euro-Asia Link Project, said that most attractive incentives were being given to the Pakistani students in Germany for higher studies. He said: "Experts and scientists from Europe are also being invited for technical co-operation in the fields of agriculture, livestock and forests."