When COVID-19 is raging around the world and Ukrainian smoke is everywhere, have we noticed that "water", a familiar and unfamiliar substance, is also disrupting the economy in 2022?
1 Global Water Threat
As we all know, water is not only widely used in agriculture, but also widely used in smelting, oil refining, fermentation, chemistry, paper making, food and pharmaceutical industries. Among them, the stable supply of water is very important for production equipment, cooling equipment and production technology.
The world can be divided into 1 1 regions, and the population of five regions is living in an environment with insufficient water supply. According to the prediction of the United Nations, by 2025, two-thirds of the world's population will face the problem of water shortage, and with population growth, urban expansion, industrial scale, and increasingly frequent extreme weather, such as drought and floods, the earth will enter an era of water shortage.
In 20 19, the water level of Panama Canal was at a historical low level, which required navigable ships to reduce water consumption. "Limited draft" directly leads to the reduction of cargo capacity, the increase of transportation cost and the extension of transportation cycle.
Extremely hot weather and low rainfall have a great impact on inland rivers, and the decrease of water level continues to destroy the river transportation industry and seriously affect the local economy.
Throughout the world's major inland rivers, parana river in South America and the Rhine in Europe, the water level has reached historical lows in the past few years. It has brought great adverse effects to local logistics and transportation, industrial production and import and export trade.