> "The river has very little water these days. It is also running out of fish. Tube wells in our village have run out of water," he says. "There's too much of uncertainty. People in our villages have moved to the cities to look for work."
Maybe this is what we need. More people move into cities rather than exploiting these critical resources at every stretch with little to no management. To go further, maybe we should be creating sanctuaries in these areas so that maybe wildlife (like fish) could make a comeback.
Pie in the sky probably. Maybe creates other issues. Maybe not feasible. China has cleared large numbers of people for projects though. There is little resources for a project which doesn't make money or is not a source of national pride (like the largest dam in the world), but I imagine the value of water is dramatically increasing.
We don't think much about this sort of thing in Western nations. I'm a U.S. citizen living in the Philippines. I'm pretty sure the only living things in the river going through the city I live in is tadpoles and bugs. What isn't killed by pollution is taken for food (though I'm not sure anyone catches anything in this river.)
All along the banks of the river is squatter areas. They use the river for laundry, bathing, drinking, etc. When there is a flood, these areas get taken out and have to rebuild.
In Manila, the river banks looked like the city dump from back home.
We are also going through a rough time with water. The lack of rain has caused the price of everything which relies on water (food) to increase. This causes further problems for people living in poverty here. Global climate change is a likely cause.
At some point, these nations may view water as a critical national resource and take action to protect it.