HYDERABAD: The idea of water conservation in cities is often limited to reducing usage in houses and workplaces, by using less water in the bathroom or by repairing leaking taps. However, there is still a lot of water we use indirectly, on a daily basis, which needs to be conserved if any long-term positive impact is to be made on water resources.
The magnitude of this indirect water consumption can be as much as 96 per cent of our daily usage, according to a study titled ‘Quantifying the water footprint of an urban agglomeration in developing economy’ by researchers from IIT Hyderabad’s Water Resources Division.
The researchers studied the water footprint of people living in the Hyderabad Metropolitan region, considering the water they used directly and indirectly under four categories — food consumption, fossil-fuels-based energy, electric power, and direct water. The water footprint of the Hyderabad Metropolitan region under these four categories was as much as 2,852 litres per capita per day (LPCD), they found.
Of this, a massive 96 per cent was through indirect usage — 70 per cent through food consumption (1,986 LPCD), 25 per cent by electric power and 1 per cent by fossil-fuels-based energy. The direct usage of water was just 4 per cent, amounting to 121 LPCD.
The logic behind this lies in the fact that our food requires a lot of water to be produced, and this is not often recognised by city dwellers, when thinking about water conservation.
Among the food categories, the most water-consuming are cereals, which, in Hyderabad’s case, are the common staple food, with rice being a water-intensive crop. Cereals are followed by milk and milk products, and eggs and meat products.
The water footprint was found to increase drastically from the lowest to the highest economic class, mainly due to higher consumption of milk, milk products, eggs, meat and fruits.
Production of Food is the guzzler
A massive 96 per cent of water consumption in the Hyderabad Metropolitan region is through indirect usage. Seventy per cent (1,986 litres per capita per day) is through food consumption, because our meals require a lot of water to be produced. Among food categories, cereals consume the most water, the researchers said