UN-Water Summit on Groundwater, 2022

UN-Water Summit on Groundwater, 2022

📅 7-8 December 2022
 Paris, France

Groundwater is invisible, and yet its impact is visible everywhere. It is a hidden treasure that enriches lives. Groundwater may be out of sight, but it must not be out of mind. The UN-Water Summit on Groundwater 2022 aims to bring attention to groundwater at the highest international level. The Summit will use the UN World Water Development Report 2022 as a baseline and the SDG 6 Global Acceleration Framework as a guideline to define actions toward more responsible and sustainable use and protection of this vital natural resource.

The Summit will unify the statements from all major water-related events in 2022 into one comprehensive groundwater message for the UN Water Conference 2023.

Groundwater: a Hidden Resource

Groundwater is a vital resource that provides almost half of all drinking water worldwide, about 40 per cent of water for irrigated agriculture, and about 1/3 of water required for the industry. It sustains ecosystems, maintains the baseflow of rivers, and prevents land subsidence and seawater intrusion. Groundwater is an important part of the climate change adaptation process and is often a solution for people without access to safely managed water.

Despite these facts, groundwater, as an ‘invisible’ resource, is out of mind for most people. However, as surface water availability decreases (due to human activities and climate change), reliance and pressure on groundwater will continue to grow. In many places, human activities over-use and pollute groundwater. In other places, the world simply does not know how much water is down there. Meanwhile, water scarcity is increasing, already affecting about 2.7 billion people around the world for at least one month per year.

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Original Source: UN-Water Summit on Groundwater, 2022