水资源英文阅读.docx

1、水资源英文阅读Sin aqua non用水之过Water shortages are a growing problem, but not for the reasons most people think水资源愈发短缺，原因却不如众人所料THE overthrow of Madagascars president in mid-March was partly caused by water problemsin South Korea. Worried by the difficulties of increasing food supplies in its water-stressed

2、 homeland, Daewoo, a South Korean conglomerate, signed a deal to lease no less than half Madagascars arable land to grow grain for South Koreans. Widespread anger at the terms of the deal (the islands people would have received practically nothing) contributed to the presidents unpopularity. One of

3、the new leaders first acts was to scrap the agreement.三月中旬，马达加斯加总统下台，水资源问题难逃其咎韩国水资源问题。韩国大宇物流集团由于担心国内水资源缺乏，粮食短缺日益严重，便租用马达加斯加近一半面积的可耕种土地，用作韩国人民粮食供给。协议中的条款引起举马达加斯加不满（因为人民几乎一无所获），总统的支持率跌至谷底。新总统上任后第一把火，就是撕毁协议。Three weeks before that, on the other side of the world, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of Calif

4、ornia declared a state of emergency. Not for the first time, he threatened water rationing in the state. “It is clear,” says a recent report by the United Nations World Water Assessment Programme, “that urgent action is needed if we are to avoid a global water crisis.”此事三周前，在世界另一端的加利福尼亚，州长阿诺.施瓦辛格宣布事

5、态紧急，扬言要在州中分区供水这已经不是第一次了。联合国世界水资源评估方案最近报道也称：“显然，如果我们希望避免全球水危急，就必须采取紧急行动。”Local water shortages are multiplying. Australia has suffered a decade-long drought. Brazil and South Africa, which depend on hydroelectric power, have suffered repeated brownouts because there is not enough water to drive the t

6、urbines properly. So much has been pumped out of the rivers that feed the Aral Sea in Central Asia that it collapsed in the 1980s and has barely begun to recover.地方水资源短缺现象日益严峻。澳大利亚干旱十年，依赖水电的巴西和南非也因为缺水，涡轮不能正常运转，只得受限电之苦。河流抽水过量，中亚咸海供水不足，20世纪80年代发生了生态灾难后，一直没能恢复。Yet local shortages, caused by individual

7、acts of mismanagement or regional problems, are one thing. A global water crisis, which impinges on supplies of food and other goods, or affects rivers and lakes everywhere, is quite another. Does the world really face a global problem?个人行为管理不善或者区域问题引发地方性短缺是一回事，然而危及粮食和其他产品供应，影响各处河流湖泊的水危机，则另当别论。现在的世界

8、，当真面临着一个全球性问题吗？Water, water everywhere水，无处不在Not on the face of it. There is plenty of water to go around and human beings are not using all that much. Every year, thousands of cubic kilometres (km3) of fresh water fall as rain or snow or come from melting ice. According to a study in 2007, most nati

9、ons outside the Gulf were using a fifth or less of the water they receiveat least in 2000, the only year for which figures are available. The global average withdrawal of fresh water was 9% of the amount that flowed through the worlds hydrologic cycle. Both Latin America and Africa used less than 6%

10、 (see table). On this evidence, it would seem that all water problems are local.表面看来，并非如此。环顾四周，水源充足，人类也并未使用如此之多。每年，雨雪和融冰所带来的淡水资源有几千立方千米。2007年一项报道称，海湾地区之外的大部分国家最多也只使用所得水资源的1/5。世界水循环中，每年平均只有9%的淡水流失。拉丁美洲和非洲所用淡水都不过6%。这表明水资源问题，只有在地区内发生。The trouble with this conclusion is that no one knows how much water

11、people can safely use. It is certainly not 100% (the amount taken in Gulf states) because the rest of creation also has to live off the water. In many places the maximum may well be less than one fifth, the average for Asia as a whole. It depends on how water is returned to the system, how much is t

12、aken from underground aquifers, and so on.此种结论的问题在于无人了解多少水资源能够供人们安全使用。当然，这一比例不会是海湾地区国家所称的100%，因为其他生物也需要靠水才能够生存。许多地区，最多也只有不过1/5的水源能够放心使用整个亚洲地区的平均值即是如此。多少水能够回归生态系统，人们从地下蓄水层中又抽取多少等，均为其决定因素。But there is some admittedly patchy evidence that, given current patterns of use and abuse, the amount now being w

13、ithdrawn is moving dangerously close to the limit of safetyand in some places beyond it. An alarming number of the worlds great rivers no longer reach the sea. They include the Indus, Rio Grande, Colorado, Murray-Darling and Yellow rivers. These are the arteries of the worlds main grain-growing area

14、s.但一些零散的证据却不置可否：按照现在滥用水源的方式，水流失之量正逼近安全限度而在某些地区已经超过。许多世界大河未曾入海就已断流，数量相当惊人：印度河、格兰德河、科罗拉多河、墨累-达令河和黄河莫不如此而这些都是世界主要粮食种植地区的大动脉。Freshwater fish populations are in precipitous decline. According to the World Wide Fund for Nature, fish stocks in lakes and rivers have fallen roughly 30% since 1970. This is a

15、bigger population fall than that suffered by animals in jungles, temperate forests, savannahs and any other large ecosystem. Half the worlds wetlands, on one estimate, were drained, damaged or destroyed in the 20th century, mainly because, as the volume of fresh water in rivers falls, salt water inv

16、ades the delta, changing the balance between fresh and salt water. On this evidence, there may be systemic water problems, as well as local disruptions.淡水鱼数量急剧下滑。世界大自然基金会称，自1970年起，河流湖泊内的鱼类资源已有大约30%灭绝，比丛林、温带森林、大草原和其他大型生态系统中动物消失数量还要多。据估计，20世纪中，世界上的一半湿地都已干涸、毁坏或惨遭破坏，原因主要在于河流中淡水资源减少，咸水趁势侵入三角洲，打破淡咸水平衡。如此看

17、来，水资源问题和地区性破坏问题，都可能会系统化。Two global trends have added to the pressure on water. Both are likely to accelerate over coming decades.两项全球性趋势也给水问题带来了压力而这两项趋势在未来几十年中都有加速倾向。The first is demography. Over the past 50 years, as the worlds population rose from 3 billion to 6.5 billion, water use roughly treble

18、d. On current estimates, the population is likely to rise by a further 2 billion by 2025 and by 3 billion by 2050. Demand for water will rise accordingly.其一是人口。过去50年中，世界人口从30亿飙升到65亿，用水量增加两倍。按照目前估测，截至2025年世界人口将再增20亿，到2050年增加30亿。水需求也会随之增加。Or rather, by more. Possibly a lot more. It is not the absolute

19、 number of people that makes the biggest difference to water use but changing habits and diet. Diet matters more than any single factor because agriculture is the modern Agasthya, the mythical Indian giant who drank the seas dry. Farmers use about three-quarters of the worlds water; industry uses le

20、ss than a fifth and domestic or municipal use accounts for a mere tenth.确切地说，是随之加速增加突飞猛进地增加。造成用水显著变化的并非是人口的绝对数量，而是人们的生活饮食习惯。饮食堪称最主要的因素，如果类比印度神话，农业就好比当代喝干海水的阿加斯提亚。农业用水占到世界用水总量的3/4，工业用水不及1/5，而生活和城市用水仅占1/10。Different foods require radically different amounts of water. To grow a kilogram of wheat requir

21、es around 1,000 litres. But it takes as much as 15,000 litres of water to produce a kilo of beef. The meaty diet of Americans and Europeans requires around 5,000 litres of water a day to produce. The vegetarian diets of Africa and Asia use about 2,000 litres a day (for comparison, Westerners use jus

22、t 100-250 litres a day in drinking and washing).不同是食物从根本上也会使用不等量的水资源。种植一公斤小麦需要大约1,000升水，但生产一公斤牛肉则需要15,000升。按照欧美人士以肉食为主的饮食习惯，每天需要5,000升水，而亚非人民的素食食谱每天只需2,000升（西方人每天饮用和洗刷的水只有100-250升）。So the shift from vegetarian diets to meaty oneswhich contributed to the food-price rise of 2007-08has big implications

23、 for water, too. In 1985 Chinese people ate, on average, 20kg of meat; this year, they will eat around 50kg. This difference translates into 390km3 (1km3 is 1 trillion litres) of wateralmost as much as total water use in Europe.因此，素食习惯向肉食的转变不仅是造成2007-08年食物价格上涨的原因，而且对水也起着至关重要的作用。1985年，中国人平均每人消费肉类20千克

24、，今年则估计达到50千克。也就是说，390立方千米（一立方千米=一万亿升）的水因此消失，相当于欧洲的总用水量。The shift of diet will be impossible to reverse since it is a product of rising wealth and urbanisation. In general, “water intensity” in food increases fastest as people begin to climb out of poverty, because that is when they start eating more

25、 meat. So if living standards in the poorest countries start to rise again, water use is likely to soar. Moreover, almost all the 2 billion people who will be added to the worlds population between now and 2030 are going to be third-world city dwellersand city people use more water than rural folk.

26、The Food and Agriculture Organisation reckons that, without changes in efficiency, the world will need as much as 60% more water for agriculture to feed those 2 billion extra mouths. That is roughly 1,500km3 of the stuffas much as is currently used for all purposes in the world outside Asia.饮食习惯的改变不

27、太可能逆转，因为此乃富裕化、城市化的产物。总体而言，饮食方面的“用水密度”随人们脱贫，达到最快速的增长，因为自此种情况下，人们摄入肉类增多。如果世界最贫困的地区生活水平再次上升，用水量就会飙升。加之从现在到2030年，全球预计增加的20亿人口，几乎全部处于第三世界城市中而城市用水要多于农村地区。世界粮农组织认为，如果用水效率不加以改观，世界对农业的水需求要增加60%，才足够喂养多出的20亿张嘴巴。换句话说，用水量需要增加1,500立方千米相当于亚洲地区以外全世界现在的用水总量。The other long-term trend affecting water is climate change

28、. There is growing evidence that global warming is speeding up the hydrologic cyclethat is, the rate at which water evaporates and falls again as rain or snow. This higher rate seems to make wet regions more sodden, and arid ones drier. It brings longer droughts between more intense periods of rain.

29、另一影响水资源的长期趋势即为气候变化。越来越多的证据表明，全球变暖正在加速水循环也就是水蒸发后再度以雨雪形式返回生态系统的速率。速率变大，湿润地区就会更加潮湿，而干旱地区则更加干燥。干旱期会越来越长，而与其交叉的降水期则更加密集。Climate change has three big implications for water use. First, it changes the way plants grow. Trees, for example, react to downpours with a spurt of growth. During the longer droughts

30、 that follow, the extra biomass then dries up so that if lightning strikes, forests burn more spectacularly. Similarly crops grow too fast, then wilt.气候变化对于用水有三大影响。首先，它改变了植物的生长方式。树木遇到倾盆大雨，会迅猛增长。而在接下来的长期干旱中，超额的生物质量会干旱，如遇闪电，森林大火则更加严重。同样，庄稼生长也会过快，然后干旱枯萎。Second, climate change increases problems of wate

31、r management. Larger floods overwhelm existing controls. Reservoirs do not store enough to get people or plants through longer droughts. In addition, global warming melts glaciers and causes snow to fall as rain. Since snow and ice are natural regulators, storing water in winter and releasing it in

32、summer, countries are swinging more violently between flood and drought. That is one big reason why dams, once a dirty word in development, have been making a comeback, especially in African countries with plenty of water but no storage capacity. The number of large dams (more than 15 metres high) has been increasing and the order books of dam builders are bulging.第二，气候变化引发更多水资源管理方面的问题。管理措施高一尺，洪水声势高一丈。水库的储存量无法保证人们和植物度过更长的干旱期。除此之外，由于全球变暖，冰川融化，降雪量减少，降雨量增加。而冰雪是自然的调度站，冬日储水，夏天释放，如此一来，许多国家气候变化更为剧烈，常常在洪水过后经历干旱。于是曾经一度为发展所不齿的水坝现在也卷土重来，尤其是在水量充足却无储存能力的非洲。大型水坝（高于15米）数量日益增多，水坝建造公司现在