Bangladesh economic growth threatened by rapidly depleting water resources

By Lou Del Bello

Bangladesh’s interim administration is mulling measures to tackle an impending water crisis that threatens to stifle its economic progress. 

Groundwater in the climate-vulnerable country is depleting faster than ever before, according to new research from WaterAid, falling by as much as three meters per year in some places. Consumption is set to reach 55 billion cubic meters per year by 2040, a 37 per cent increase from 2020 levels.

Despite the recent political upheaval, Bangladesh has great economic potential, said Jonathan Farr, director at WaterAid’s Resilient Water Accelerator. “It has a very skilled, highly educated population,” he said, but too much of the country’s growth is fueled by increasing demand for water, in particular for rice cultivation and industries such as textiles.  

Climate change is an added risk. Bangladesh experiences flooding from a web of tributaries feeding into the Ganges river, saline intrusion from sea level rise and seasonal cyclones, all of which will be exacerbated by global warming. This complex hydrology compounds water contamination from industrial activities. Despite achieving annual economic growth above 6 per cent, nearly half of the country’s population still lacks reliable access to clean water, the WaterAid report showed. 

Syeda Rizwana Hasan, the adviser in charge of water and environment within the newly formed government, acknowledged that Bangladesh will have to reduce water extraction to prevent desertification. Officials are “working to develop a time-bound action plan to clean up rivers, so that the country can switch to surface water,” she said in an interview.

Currently, groundwater is used to irrigate more than 70 per cent of Bangladesh’s cultivated land and it meets over 98 per cent of its industrial demand, according to WaterAid. 

Hasan said the environment ministry is working on regulations to govern groundwater extraction and guidelines for industrial water use. The recommendations will eventually become a legally binding framework on the reuse and recycling of water by companies, though a timeline for implementing the measures hasn’t been determined. 

For agriculture, which currently accounts for 80 per cent of total water demand, the government intends to promote drought resistant crop varieties, Hasan said. “Groundwater will not be free for commercial interests and for those who can pay.”

Bangladesh’s current water plans would require an investment of nearly $50 billion through 2030, but less than 20 per cent of that has been currently allocated, according to the report. The International Monetary Fund has offered assistance to the new administration over the past few weeks, but Hasan said that the water plans have yet to be discussed externally.