Demographics and Water Resources As Cause of Crisis

Demographics and Water Resources as cause of Crisis

By Christos Iacovou

Director of Cyprus Research Center

This analysis looks at certain on-going developments in the Near East that are likely to endure and that will influence the course of Cyprus’ security environment in the first half of the 21st century. Such developments include demographic explosion and struggles over resources.

In the last half of the twentieth century, Near East was a region of interstate wars and internal upheaval. Now, in the first decade of the twenty-first century, what can we say about the future of the Near East? Will it continue to be a region of war and violence?

Demographic Explosion

In the 21st century, within the Near East, which is largely Muslim, demography is likely to cause one of history's great transformations. In 1980 Muslims constituted perhaps 18 percent of the world's population. By the end of the first quarter of the 21st century, they are expected to constitute more than 30 percent. In the Middle East itself, this rapid rate of growth is expected to continue. Thus, Egypt is expected to climb from a population level of less than 74 million people today to nearly 120 million by the middle of this century. Saudi Arabia is expected to nearly triple in size from 23 million to 61 million. Syria will become a major demographic power with nearly 50 million people by 2050. Next door, Iran will swell to more than 150 million people, or larger than Russia today. These are major demographic shifts that are certain to alter the history of the region.

In many Western countries, people tend to equate the Middle East with political violence. For this reason it is instructive to look at the changing demographic picture of Muslim states as a whole. In many of these states a distinguishing feature of the population has been the swelling numbers of young people, who in their impatience, place severe demands on any political system. Over the past three decades, those Muslim countries in which the group of persons between 15 and 24 years of age constituted roughly 20 percent of the total population, or more, included such countries as Bosnia and Iran in the 1970s, Albania, Syria and Turkey in the 1980s, and Algeria, Indonesia, Iran, and Jordan in the 1990s. Is it an accident then that some of the most violent societies in the world in the last several years have been Albania, Algeria, Bosnia, Iran, and Turkey? Can we explain this violence by bad leadership alone, or was there a degree of demographic pressure that no government could handle effectively whether the state was to be found in the Middle East or in Europe?

Struggle over Resources

Meanwhile, another path to influence and power has opened up. Developments in China during the last two decades have shown that governments can acquire great influence not through external expansion but through internal development. This powerful example will pose an awkward challenge to Near Eastern states in the coming century. The Near East remains one of the few areas of the world where the struggle over resources-oil and water-continues, and where, therefore, war still pays. It also remains one of the few areas of the world where leaders believe they will gain wealth and influence through war rather than internal development.

In the Middle East, it will still be true that war will pay in a way that it will not in most other regions. Victory may bring land that offers more resources-either water or oil. Had Iraq won the Gulf War, it would have had more oil.

According to the Department of Energy, world oil consumption is expected to increase from 77.8 million barrels a day (mbd) in 1995 to 104.6 mbd in 2015. The Gulf countries will have to nearly double their production, or the increase in demand will not be met. Much of the new demand will come from Asia, which will almost certainly take a much greater interest in the affairs of the Gulf in the future than it has in the past. China's oil requirements are expected to more than double between 1995 and 2015. Where will China secure that oil? In the case of Japan, which is dependent on Middle East oil, Tokyo has been content to see the United States guard the oil lanes. China is unlikely to be satisfied with American guardianship. That is undoubtedly why it is developing a blue water navy. In the next century, one can expect conflicts between the United States and China over the Near East.

As early as the 1980s, intelligence experts within the US government began identifying areas in the world where conflict might break out over the issue of water. Most of these were in the Near East. Israel is estimated to be currently using its water resources at roughly 20 percent beyond their natural replenishment rate, and Israel's population is expected to increase by three million people by 2050. Jordan, with a scarcity of water already, expects its population to grow from 6.4 million in 2000 to nearly 17 million in 2050.

Oil is one of the few resources left over which nations lacking it may fight. Water is perhaps the only resource over which any country facing severe shortages will fight. Here the conjuncture of the Near East's population growth and its largely desert climate suggests a very turbulent future.

In the 21st century, most of the states of the Near East will face, some challenges that others do not. However, they may not be content merely to accept their fate. We have to hope that they will not. We must hope that they will press for reform. In that case, neighbouring states, and especially the European Union should help them. It is in no one's interest for this great region to remain a cauldron of discontent. It is the right moment for the EU to rethink its Europemediaterranean Policy.