World Water Week to focus on climate change, biofuels

Climate change and a potential water shortage in some regions, also due to the diversion of water to crops for biofuels, will be at the centre of the 2007 World Water Week which opens here Monday, with 2,500 international experts expected to attend.

The theme of the annual event's 17th edition will be "Progress and Prospects on Water: Striving for Sustainability in a Changing World."

Organiser Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI) noted that water was playing a key role in global warming.

"It is through water people are impacted the most by climate change," SIWI spokesman David Trouba told AFP.

World Water Week will also discuss biofuels, destined to partially offset a coming oil shortage and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but which also need huge amounts of water.

"Where will the water to grow the food needed to feed a growing population come from if more and more water is diverted to crops for biofuels production?" asked Trouba.

The European Union wants biofuels to account for 10 percent of the total of motor fuels in 2020, against an estimated 1.6 percent last year.
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