The United Nations has warned that climate change is making the Earth’s water cycle increasingly erratic, resulting in extreme swings between deluge and drought across the world.
In a report released on Thursday, the UN’s World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said that the global water cycle was becoming ever more unpredictable, with shrinking glaciers, droughts, unbalanced river basins and severe floods wreaking havoc.
“The world’s water resources are under growing pressure and, at the same time, more extreme water-related hazards are having an increasing impact on lives and livelihoods,” WMO chief Celeste Saulo said in a statement accompanying the release of the annual State of Global Water Resources report.
The international group of scientists assessed freshwater availability and water storage across the world, including lakes, river flow, groundwater, soil moisture, snow cover and ice melt.
Last year was the hottest on record, leading to prolonged droughts in northern parts of South America, the Amazon Basin and Southern Africa.
Parts of Central Africa, Europe and Asia, meanwhile, were dealing with wetter weather than usual, being hit with devastating floods or deadly storms, said the report.
At a global level, WMO said, 2024 was the sixth consecutive year where there had been a “clear imbalance” in the world’s river basins.
“Two-thirds have too much or too little water – reflecting the increasingly erratic hydrological cycle,” it said.
While the world has natural cycles of climate variability from year to year, long-term trends outlined in the report indicate that the water cycle, at a global scale, is accelerating.
Stefan Uhlenbrook, WMO director of hydrology in the water and cryosphere division, said scientists feel it is “increasingly difficult to predict”.
Story was adapted from Aljazeera.
