Assessing Water Scarcity Using the Water Poverty Index (WPI) in Golestan Province of Iran

Masoud Jafari Shalamzari,Wanchang Zhang

doi:10.3390/w10081079

Masoud Jafari Shalamzari, Wanchang Zhang

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/w10081079

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Abstract

Population growth and rising water demand, climate change, severe droughts, and land-use changes are among the top severe issues in Iran. Water management in this country is sectoral and disintegrated. Each authority evaluates water based on its final intention and there is no commonplace indicator for evaluation programs. In this research, we used the Water Poverty Index (WPI) to map the status of water scarcity in a north-eastern province of Iran. Water poverty was measured based on five components of “Resources”, “Access”, “Capacity”, “Use”, and “Environment”. The scores on each component were then aggregated using the weighted multiplicative function, assuming equal weights for all components. The overall WPI was evaluated to be 41.1, signaling an alarming and serious water poverty in the study area. Based on the results, Azadshahr (29.1) and Gorgan (61.6) districts had the worst and the best conditions among all cases, respectively. To better understand the importance of WPI components, four weighting alternatives were used; however, none of them resulted in a tangible improvement of WPI index. The cross-correlation between the components was also evaluated, with Access and Capacity showing significant results. Leaving out “Capacity”, however, reduced WPI by 8.1. In total, “Access”, “Capacity”, and “Use” had the highest correlation with WPI, implying that any attempt to improve water poverty in the province must firstly tackle these issues. This study showed that WPI is an effective indicator of water scarcity assessment and could be used to make priorities for policy-making and water management.

Highlights

Water is the fundamental basis of life and should be regarded as an inevitable necessity of sustainable development
The items used to estimate the Water Poverty Index (WPI) index were identified in close collaboration with the scientific community working in the field of water management in Golestan Province
We estimated the level of water scarcity in different districts of Golestan Province of Iran using the WPI

Summary

Introduction

Water is the fundamental basis of life and should be regarded as an inevitable necessity of sustainable development. Water is an integral part of social and economic development in any country. Water resources are unevenly distributed on earth. More than two billion people live in highly water-stressed areas because of this uneven distribution of water resources [1]. Water is becoming a rare commodity for most people [2]. This is especially the case in the populated arid areas of the Central and West Asia and North Africa, with less than 1000 m3 /capita/year water availability [3]. The demand for water is highly likely to grow in the 21st century which calls for a wise management of scarce water resources [4]. The main challenges ahead related to water are freshwater scarcity, lack of access to adequate and clean drinking water and sanitation, deterioration of water quality, political fragmentation in water resources management, Water 2018, 10, 1079; doi:10.3390/w10081079 www.mdpi.com/journal/water

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