1. Water Futures
Featured Futurists:
Eric Semler, Molly Myers and David
Collett

2. “Whiskey is for drinking, water
is for fighting over.” – Mark Twain

3. Scarcity

4. China
“With almost a quarter of its land
classified as desert, China ranks as the
world’s most arid country.”
“An estimated 300 million people in
China have limited supply of water”
(Sinha, 2011, p. 422).

5. China
“The south has a lot of water, the north
little… if possible, it is okay to lend a
little water.” – Mao Zedong

6. China and India
“Water is becoming a key security issue
in Sino-Indian relations and a potential
source of enduring discord.”
“China and India are water-stressed
economies” (Chellaney, 2009, p. 38).

7. Allocation

8. Tibet
“It has also been called ‘The Third
Pole’ because next to the North and
South Poles, its glaciers contain the
largest volume of fresh frozen water
on earth” (Borges, 2013, p. 114).

9. Tibet
“More importantly, it is known as
‘The Water Tower of Asia’ since the
rivers flowing out of those glaciers
supply nearly a third of the world’s
population with their water” (Borges,
2013, p. 114).

10. Tibet
“Without Tibet, China’s hydrological
supremacy would be overturned
from water independence to
dependence” (Sinha, 2011, p. 423).

11. History
“China has already dammed every major river on
the Tibetan Plateau – including the Mekong, the
Salween, the Brahmaputra, the Yangtze, the
Yellow, the Indus, the Sutlej, the Shwelie and the
Karnali” (Chellaney, 2011, p. 308).

12. Discussion
China is considering diverting the
Brahmaputra River away from India and
into China (Chellaney, 2009, p. 38).
What are possible outcomes if China
follows through with this plan?

13. Allocation
China and India will need to negotiate the
use of water in the future.
“For that to happen, water has to become a
source of cooperation, not conflict”
(Chellaney, 2009, p. 39).

14. Trends

15. Trends
• Future conflicts will be over water.
• As the world population increases, scarcity of
water will increase.
• Tension between China and India will increase.
• Tibet is critically important to China and will
remain critically important.
• Riparian states will continue to negotiate
treaties over water rights.

16. Water is the driving force of all nature.
- Leonardo da Vinci

17. Join the Movement
Please join our movement to bring awareness to
the trends surrounding this issue.
Visit our site at:
www.waterfutures.wordpress.com
Find us on Twitter: @WaterFuturesNSU and
@H2Oisourfuture

18. Join the Movement

19. Join the Movement

20. References
• Borges, P. (2013). Tibet: culture on the edge. World
Literature Today, 87(2), 112-117.
• Chellaney, B. (2009). Coming water wars. The
International Economy, 23(4), 38-39.
• Chellaney, B. (2011). Water: Asia's new battleground.
Contemporary Southeast Asia, 24(2), 307-308.
• Sinha, U. K. (2011). China: geopolitics of a thirsty
nation. Indian Foreign Affairs Journal, 6(4),
422-436.