In 2018, low levels of rainfall and increased water consumption left Cape Town exposed to drought and edged it towards becoming the first major city to run out of water. As a response, Cape Town introduced a countdown to day Zero, the day when dam water reserves would hit just 13.5% capacity. A broad range of measures, including restrictions, improved monitoring, education and communication, enabled the city to avoid a complete failure of its water systems by drastically reducing water consumption.
Though droughts are natural events, there is an increasing understanding of how humans have amplified their severity and worsened their effects on both the environment and human populations. Humans have altered both meteorological droughts through human-induced climate change and hydrological droughts through management of water movement and processes within a landscape, such as by diverting rivers or changing land use. In the Anthropocene (the ongoing period in which humans are the dominant influence on climate and the environment), droughts are closely entwined with human actions, cultures and responses.
This series of videos explains the effects of drought all around the world through the presentation of case studies.
They are the result of the work of UNESCO’s International Hydrologica Programme (IHP) in partnership with GRID-Arendal, the University of Southampton and the U.S. National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS).
