The Impact of Water Scarcity on Food Security in Iraq

Iraq is part of the Fertile Crescent with the two large rivers: Tigris and Euphrates and their tributaries that secure the required quantity and quality of water to the Iraqi population for their different uses; including agriculture, industry, and other domestic requirements. During the last decades, however, the quantity and quality of water in these rivers decreased causing water scarcity in the country. This scarcity is having severe impacts on food security in Iraq since large cultivated areas in different parts of the country that grow different agricultural products have been abandoned due to lack of water. The worsening situation is attributed mainly to global climate changes including decreasing rainfall amounts, increase in air temperature, and insufficient water inflows in the two main rivers and their tributaries. This last issue is exasperated by the unfair water sharing policies of the riparian countries namely Turkey and Iran. In writing this article relevant data from different sources were used. Numerous published reports and papers dealing with this important issue were consulted, while at the same time, the long experience of the authors in these very important issues was also drawn upon to elucidate the difficulties that are current today and those expected in the future in this field.