A key 2017 report by Ceres highlighted the industry’s water risks while identifying how investors can push companies toward better water-management strategies.
“Feeding Ourselves Thirsty: Tracking Food Company Progress toward a Water-Smart Future” analyzed how 42 major food and beverage companies are addressing water risk.
Meanwhile, $198 billion is considered subject to the effects of climate change on crop production.
What Is Water Risk?
With agriculture accounting for roughly 70 percent of global freshwater withdrawal, these factors pose serious material risk to food companies’ financial performance.
A group of investors with a collective $1 trillion in assets – all members of the Ceres investor network – issued joint letters to four of the meat industry’s largest producers, pressing the companies to address the water-related risk associated with feeding, slaughtering and processing livestock.
We couldn’t just say, ‘We should have a water-reduction target.’” Instead, ACTIAM has focused on setting goals regionally.
“Find a way that you can integrate that locality of the issue into your strategy.” Addressing Risk at the Local Level Matt Howard, director of the Alliance for Water Stewardship North America, said local solutions are important.
He said the food and beverage industry’s complex global supply chains are one key challenge.
Roberts said Ceres will also publish another update to the report in 2019 to track progress and identify where gaps remain.

City of Windhoek urged residents be mindful and vigilant in their water use to maintain consumption to within the target level, the highest water consumption level that was recorded from in the past 18 months at 14% between 12 to 19 November.
The City attributes the high water consumption to the unusual hot weather experienced over the past few days.
In a statement this week, the City said that together with NamWater, it put in measures to sustain water supply amidst challenging circumstances and a general water scarcity in the central region through meticulous planning and management of available sources.
“However, the biggest contributor to this effort is the responsible behavior of our water consumers, hence a renewed caution that current consumption levels are not sustainable for the immediate future and increases the likelihood of another water crisis and severe restrictions being enforced on all consumers,” the City stated.
Windhoek residents are therefore urged to refer to and strictly adhere to the terms of the City of Windhoek Water Management Plan which is available on the City’s website.

Chandrapur: Clean and safe drinking water is still a dream for Bandiri village under Chandrapur block in Rayagada district as the defunct water tank fails to supply water.
According to villagers, a water tank was built by the Rural Water Supply Department to provide clean drinking water to around 3000 residents of the village, three years ago.
However, it stopped working after a few days of its construction.
There are five tube wells in the village.
However, they fail to meet the drinking water needs of the villagers, following which the villagers depend on nearby canal and water pits, said Sunil Tangaranga, Indu Tangaranga , Jitendra Tangaranga and other villagers.
Another villager Arjun Malabisoi said the villagers depend on the nearby canal for their daily activities.
However, the problem would be doubled soon as the canal would go dry within two- three months.
On the other hand, some villagers said they have been informing the drinking water supply department about the impending crisis, but no action has been taken so far.
When contacted, the Assistant Engineer of Rural Water Supply Department, Jitendra Patra, said the water scarcity would be tackled within 10 to 12 days after digging a bore well in the village.

The Lagos Water Corporation, LWC, has restored potable water supply to Lagos residents, particularly those that have been affected with the disruption of water supply due to the leakage of 1600MM diameter pipe, at Akute intakes which adversely affected the operations of 70MGD Adiyan Waterworks.
In a Statement released by the Corporation’s Group Managing Director/CEO, Engr.
Muminu Badmus, the LWC boss apologized to the customers over the hardship caused by the water scarcity, as the corporation woud never toy with the emotions of the Lagosians.
He further stated that Adiyan Waterworks had since commenced operations.
He, however, expressed his deep appreciation to the general public, thanking them for their patience, endurance, cooperation and support during this period of the hardship as they stood by the Corporation, adding that LWC is always ready to serve them better.
Badmus, therefore, enjoined Lagosians to continue to support the government’s efforts in providing potable water supply in the State, as the government is undauntedly working round the clock to ensure adequate supply of potable Water to every home in the State.

Cuttack: Hundreds of women from Kairapari village under Kotasahi panchayat gheraoed the Tangi Block development officer(BDO ) inside his office protesting drinking water crisis in the area.
According to sources, the ‘Swajaldhara’ water project has stopped functioning while the sole tube-well in the village is also lying defunct for the past four months.
As a result, the residents here are facing problems due to acute water shortage.
With no other option, the people are forced to consume contaminated water from the village pond, alleged the residents.
Though the local villagers and the Sarpanch had brought the matter to the notice of administration, the officials did not pay any heed to their grievances.
“Our life has become miserable due to water scarcity.
If they will not resolve our problem we will continue our protest” said Sasmita Nayak, a local resident.
Meanwhile, the agitating women have submited a memorandum of their demands to the BDO.
“They have submitted a memorandum and I have instructed the Junior Engineer (JE) and Assistant Engineer to resolve the issue at the earliest” said Tangi BDO, Binod Senapati.

Meanwhile, videos circulated on social media show police and security forces attacking farmers allegedly responsible for the disruption.
Three small reservoirs in the village of Qarneh, east of Isfahan, have been destroyed and transferring water to Yazd disrupted, IRNA cited Yazd Water Company’s PR director, Alireza Karbalaei Akrami as saying.
Furthermore, videos on social media also show that clashes between security forces and enraged farmers were still going on later on Sunday.
Transferring water from Isfahan to its arid neighboring province, Yazd, was vandalized and disrupted by unknown attackers on Friday November 16, but the facilities were repaired, and the operation went back to normal on Saturday, November 17.
Eastern parts of Isfahan province, with a population of 300,000 who are mainly farmers, has been hit by a severe water scarcity since the project for transferring water to Yazd has become operational.
The person addressing the crowd tells security forces to defend the rights of the farmers.
Responding to the protests, the government has promised to tackle the farmers’ demands, immediately after the project for Third Koohrang Tunnel becomes operational.
Furthermore, other water transfer projects across the country have led to enraged protest rallies, including in the oil-rich province of Khuzestan.
In the meantime, the Islamic Republic’s minister of Interior, Abdor-Reza Rahmani Fazli has warned that Iran’s profile will be totally changed in five years if the current drought continued.
Echoing Rahmani Fazli’s comments, the minister of Energy, Reza Ardakanian has also admitted that Iran is struggling with the "monster" of water shortage.

The aim of the panel discussion was to understand the causes for the severe water crisis prevalent in our country, and discuss the best possible course of action to tackle the imminent threat.
The event was attended by students, faculty, environmentalists and media representatives.
Director KUL and Professor at IBA Dr Nausheen Anwar commenced the event by familiarizing the audience with the purpose of KUL which is to encourage critical thinking of urban issues, out of which water is a major one.
She highlighted the importance of water as a part of the urban landscape that not only connects to the cities but also to other terrains, which include ecology, conflicts, governance and institutional dynamics.
Journalist and Geographer Afia Salam with other esteemed panelists from Commission on Science and Technology for Sustainable Development in the South (CST), Hisaar Foundation and NED UET began the panel discussion by focusing on the complex dynamics that have shaped Pakistan’s current state of water scarcity.
The panelists probed into how and why Pakistan has gotten to this stage, what kinds of policies and pragmatic solutions are viable for surmounting the challenge, and what should be a collective ‘water vision’ as we go forward.
An eminent hydrologist from CST, Dr. Hassan Abbas, gave an extensive account of the history of water management and water flow in Pakistan, since the Mughal era and the British colonial rule.
He talked about the historical engineering of the Indus River Basin, and its significance to water supply, distribution and management at different scales.
He also discussed the current policy focus on building dams.
Faisal Hassan, an award winning agriculturalist from Punjab, commented on the significant relationship between agriculture farming, water and climate change.

Supervisors approved a request for a housing development near Woodlake, affirming a previous decision by the planning commission and following a recommendation from Tulare County administrators.
Supervisors approved the Antelope Valley subdivision, which will comprise of 43 single-family residential lots over about 125 acres, west of Road 220 and north of Avenue 260, northeast of Woodlake.
“Something that will provide housing for the county of Tulare, something that will provide a nice venue for people to live.” The project isn’t without criticism.
Supervisors decided to approve the proposed housing project despite concerns about water scarcity and quality, road conditions, flooding in the area and increased traffic.
“The water situation will not get better.
It will get worse.” However, Boyd said there are 26 residential wells in the project’s area, providing enough water for residents.
Everett Welch, also a Woodlake area resident, said flooding will be an issue.
A portion of Avenue 360 near the proposed project flooded this spring.
“It flooded twice a year in the last five years,” he said.
Boyd said Redfield addressed those issues and brought it back to the table.

HYDERABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News – 23rd Nov, 2018 ) :The Sindh Government would takeover, operate and maintain all the Reverse Osmosis (RO) drinking water plants in Thar Coal Block-II.
Thar Foundation will bear all the expenses to operate and maintain these plants at international standards.
The endeavor will benefit approximately 10,000 local population in Thar Coal Block-II and adjacent areas by providing them safe drinking water complying to WHO standards.
In the first phase, eight RO Plants located in Thar Coal Block-II area have been handed over to Thar Foundation, which were earlier being operated by a GoS appointed contractor.
In a letter issued to Thar Foundation by Sindh Public Health Engineering Department, all RO plants located in Thar Coal Block-II shall be fully repaired and maintained by Thar Foundation on its own expenses.
Thar Foundation has been established by the Sindh Government together with Companies engaged in Thar Coal projects to improve the lives of the real stakeholders of Thar coal project, the residents and communities of Tharparkar.
Terming the move of provincial government in the right direction to address the drinking water scarcity in Thar, Shamsuddin Ahmed Shaikh, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Thar Foundation said they want to partner with Sindh Government in uplifting the human development of Thar in all aspects.
He said, "We aspire to adopt and implement the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals in an accelerated model for the entire tehsil of Islamkot � thereby making it Pakistan’s first SDG-compliant tehsil by 2024 � six years ahead of the global timeline," he said.
He further said that they are already running around a state of the art RO plants successfully, serving 25,000 inhabitants of the area since last two years.
"If Sindh Government hands over all the RO Plants of Taulka Islamkot, approximately 100 in total to Thar Foundation at a market-based operating cost, we will prove our capacity and commitment to deliver the desired results," he said.

Aurangabad: In the wake of growing water scarcity in Aurangabad district, the district administration has started a special cell to address the drinking water related woes and other issues, for the rural population.
The Aurangabad Zilla Parishad has deputed three officials, including one senior official, for manning the cell, which is expected to take note of the grievances raised by citizens.
The cell can be reached on 0240-2344266 or 2330649, an official release said.
“The measure, in the form of setting up a special cell, aims at addressing the issues that are being faced by the rural population which are related to drinking water.
The target population can register their complaints related to the availability of water.
The complaints will be addressed immediately after its scrutiny and government machinery will be mobilized for necessary action,” he said.
Welcoming the move, residents from the rural areas said that the authorities should give them a token number in receipt of every complaint that is registered.
“Several villages are likely to face a drinking water crisis.
If a token number is given to us, we can follow the progress of our complaint,” said Sahdev Shelke, a resident of Kannad taluka.
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