The security of water in Asia and the Pacific

ABSTRACT

Water security is a major cause for concern in East Asia and the Pacific. Who ensures a regional supply of clean water? How will the region cope with increased population growth, climate change, water mismanagement, urban pollution, changes in agricultural production and calls upon water to replace carbon dependency in the search for energy supplies? Who ensures the security of those millions of people who are uprooted and displaced in the process of economic growth and the liberalisation of markets? This paper examines some of the challenges facing the critical security project in interrogating the spaces in which security and advocacy are articulated and implemented, in order to illustrate through regionalism alternative spaces for tackling concerns associated with environmental security. In so doing, it illustrates examples from the Mekong and the Pacific Islands.

KEYWORDS:

• Water security
• environment
• Mekong
• Pacific Islands
• region

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

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3. See www.sumernet.org/content/effective-policy-advocacy-mekong-relationships-and-information-flows-needed-across-national, accessed on 2 September 2017.

4. See www.scidev.net/asia-pacific/water/news/saving-pacific-islands-water-resources.html, accessed on 2 September 2017.

5. See www.ipsnews.net/2013/04/water-shortage-hits-pacific-women, accessed on 2 September 2017.

6. See www.scidev.net/asia-pacific/water/news/saving-pacific-islands-water-resources.html, accessed on 2 September 2017.

7. See www.pireport.org/articles/2017/03/05/cooks-ngo-huge-task-tackle-plastic-waste-pacific-waters, accessed on 2 September 2017.

8. See www.forumsec.org/resources/uploads/attachments/documents/what-is-the-framework-for-pacific-regionalism.pdf, accessed on 2 September 2017.

9. See www.forumsec.org/pages.cfm/strategic-partnerships-coordination/nsa-engagement, accessed on 2 September 2017.

10. See www.forumsec.org/resources/uploads/attachments/documents/what-is-the-framework-for-pacific-regionalism.pdf, accessed on 2 September 2017.

11. See www.scidev.net/asia-pacific/water/news/saving-pacific-islands-water-resources.html, accessed on 2 September 2017.

12. See www.piango.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/PIANGO-Strategic-Plan-2013-2015.pdf, accessed on 2 September 2017.

13. See http://pacificidf.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/Charter.pdf, accessed on 2 September 2017.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Julie Gilson

Julie Gilson is Reader in Asian Studies at the University of Birmingham.