UAE looks to bring 'creative mind' to bear on world's water crisis

Senegal and UAE to co-host UN water summit in 2026 amid race to address climate change and poverty

Volunteers clear up after an oil spill in the Philippines. Scientists say billions of people around the world lack access to uncontaminated water. AFP

The UAE vowed on Tuesday to "take forward” a push for clean water in the face of poverty, disease and climate change when it hosts the UN's next water summit.

A 2026 summit co-hosted by the UAE and Senegal will come as time runs out to hit 2030 anti-poverty goals, and with the UN warning that six billion people will live with water shortages by 2050.

Expectations of progress will be high after more than 800 pledges were made at the last UN water summit in 2023.

"We’re not here to reinvent the wheel. We’re here to actually take it forward,” said Shaima Gargash, director of energy and sustainability at the UAE's Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The UAE is no stranger to the crisis because the Middle East is a water-scarce region, she told a World Water Week panel in Sweden.

One idea is to encourage research and development in the manner of the Zayed Sustainability Prize and the Expo Live funding programme in the UAE.

"We’re using the example of what has been working in the UAE and elevating it internationally,” Ms Gargash told diplomats.

"A few decades ago, the UAE started developing various competitions and platforms that bring in the creative mind to come up with solutions.

"We’ve talked about the need to bring in the private sector, but also the scientists and the academics as well. There is a strong element of research and development.”

A new study suggested this month that as many as four billion people do not have safe drinking water, twice as many as previously thought.

Figures shared with The National suggest about 250 million people in the Middle East and North Africa do not use a safely managed water supply.

The study said contaminated water is a "major driver” of diarrhoea, which in turn is a prominent cause of child mortality.

France and Kazakhstan plan to hold interim talks on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly next month to encourage countries to act.

"The idea is not to launch new commitments because we have enough commitments,” said Barbara Pompili, who is preparing the talks on behalf of French President Emmanuel Macron.

"I see too many people saying 'climate change is a burden … and now we have this water problem, another burden'. We have to show that it could be a great opportunity for a lot of countries and a lot of people.”

Climate summits

At last year's Cop28 climate summit in Dubai, dozens of countries committed to protecting 30 per cent of their rivers and freshwater sources.

The talks marked a "real breakthrough” in which water was also declared one of seven key resilience targets, said UK official Andrew Roby.

Water will again be "specifically addressed” on the agenda of the Cop29 summit taking place in Azerbaijan in November, said its president-designate, Mukhtar Babayev, on Tuesday.

Azerbaijan has cited the decline of the Caspian Sea as an example of the severe threat brought by changes to the planet.

"These are systems on which human society and the living planet rely,” Mr Babayev said.

"Interruptions in the water cycle are some of the most direct ways that people experience climate change.”