More than two billion people already live in regions facing a scarcity of water, and unless the world changes its ways over the next 50 years, the amount of water needed for a rapidly growing population will double, scientists warned in a study released yesterday. At the worst, a deepening water crisis would fuel violent conflicts, dry up rivers and increase groundwater pollution, their report says. It would also force the rural poor to clear ever more grasslands and forests to grow food and leave many more people hungry. The report, which draws on the research of more than 400 hydrologists, agronomists and other scientists, was sponsored by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research, the world’s premier network of agricultural research centers, among others. The authors of the report, ‘Water for Good, Water for Life: Insights from the Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture,’ concluded that countries confronting severe water shortages cannot simply employ the same strategies for increasing food production that have had dramatic success over the past half-century. Since 1950, the acreage of land under irrigation - a driving factor behind the Green Revolution […]