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Brian Chatterton was educated in India, Australia, and Britain. He then became a farmer, grapegrower, and winemaker and was elected to the South Australian Parliament in 1973. He became Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries, and Forests two years later. Since retirement he has consulted on dryland farming and water issues in North Africa and West Asia. See www.drylandfarming.org.
We are entering the era of water scarcity throughout the world. Water scarcity is different from mined resources that become scarce when the lode runs out. Water is almost always renewable. The scarcity applies to expansion. For thousands of years, supply has been expanded through engineering. Nowhere is that more obvious than in Egypt, where water demand has been met by increasing supply. Expansion accelerated during the 19th and 20th centuries, but has now ground to a halt as there is no more water to collect, store, and distribute.
