Water scarcity is often presented as an unavoidable consequence of arid climates, particularly across the MENA region and other parts of the Global South. This narrative, widely circulated in institutional discourse, naturalizes the problem and depoliticizes water. Yet international analyses and scientific research show a starkly different reality: the crisis is not primarily about rainfall; it is a crisis of governance, land management, and the breakdown of hydrological cycles.

This pattern is not confined to one country—it spans arid and semi-arid regions globally. Water scarcity results less from absolute shortages than from a systemic disruption of ecological processes, caused by development and planning choices that have fractured the natural balance between soils, vegetation, surface waters, and groundwater.

When water management destroys the water cycle

For decades, water policies in the MENA region and beyond have focused narrowly on “blue water”: large dams, inter-basin transfers, deep wells, heavy infrastructure, and centralized networks. While these interventions temporarily meet immediate demand, they undermine the foundations of water security.

Soil degradation, deforestation, surface sealing, extractive agriculture, and rapid urbanization have collectively diminished the ability of territories to:

  • absorb rainfall,
  • store moisture in soils,
  • recharge aquifers,
  • regulate floods and droughts.

The consequences are visible everywhere: overexploited aquifers, erratic river flows, stressed reservoirs, while intense rainfall events produce massive runoff, floods, and water loss. Water falls but does not stay.

The myth of large dams

In arid regions, large dams occupy a central place in political and technical imagination. They symbolize control, security, and modernity. Yet research across dry regions exposes their structural limits.

The bigger the reservoir, the greater the evaporation losses. Sedimentation gradually reduces effective storage. Centralizing water in massive structures disconnects landscapes upstream from their hydrological function. Across watersheds, increased central storage often reduces the water truly available to the land and its people.

Comparative studies show that decentralized, smaller-scale water structures—weirs, check dams, infiltration basins, temporary ponds—often produce more usable water than single, monumental dams. By slowing flows, these structures enhance infiltration, recharge shallow aquifers, and sustain vegetation.

The greatest reservoir we ignore: the soil

The largest terrestrial freshwater reservoir is not an artificial lake, but a living soil. Research in agronomy and hydrology demonstrates that soils rich in organic matter function like sponges, capable of storing enormous volumes of water and releasing it gradually. Degraded soils—compacted, chemically treated, over-plowed—repel water, turning each rainfall into runoff, erosion, or irreversible loss.

Globally, soils have lost massive volumes of water in recent decades. This silent hemorrhage is often attributed to climate change alone, yet it is largely caused by systemic destruction of soil water retention capacity: industrial agriculture, deforestation, urban sprawl, and centralized hydraulic management.

An ignored hydrological paradox

One of the clearest markers of this collapse is the coexistence of chronic droughts with sudden floods. This paradox is not a climatic anomaly; it is a symptom of a broken hydrological cycle.

Across the MENA region and the Global South, water security depends as much on aquifers as on ecosystems that have been degraded into “hydraulic wastelands,” unable to capture and retain water where it falls.

Water as a national security issue

In arid countries, water is not just another sector. It underpins:

  • food security,
  • social stability,
  • territorial balance,
  • internal migrations,
  • economic sovereignty.

Yet water governance remains fragmented. Agriculture, energy, urban planning, environment, and climate are treated separately, even though water is the functional link between all systems. This fragmentation weakens investment efficiency, heightens risks, and prevents strategic long-term planning.

A paradigm shift: restoring water to the territories

The emerging consensus from international research is clear: water security cannot rely solely on increasing supply. It requires restoring water cycles at the landscape scale.

This demands a radical shift:

  • From managing water as a resource to managing hydrological processes,
  • From treating soils, vegetation, rivers, wetlands, and agricultural landscapes as passive elements to seeing them as living water infrastructure,
  • Integrating nature-based solutions (NbS) systematically into agricultural, urban, and climate policies.

Experiences across arid regions demonstrate that sustainable water availability can be increased without new withdrawals by:

  • restoring soil permeability,
  • slowing surface flows,
  • recharging aquifers through floodwaters,
  • regenerating degraded ecosystems.

Watersheds as the strategic unit

Planning must focus on watersheds, where agricultural, urban, energy, and ecological uses intersect and where conflicts can be arbitrated. This approach allows:

  • breaking sectoral silos,
  • empowering local communities, farmers, and users,
  • making ecosystem restoration a core condition of water security.

Conclusion: escaping the hydraulic illusion

Water scarcity in the MENA region and the Global South is neither a climatic curse nor a geographical inevitability. It is the outcome of cumulative political and technical choices rooted in the ideology of centralized control and hydraulic dominance.

Restoring water cycles restores territories’ capacity to generate life, stability, and sovereignty. In a world of increasing hydrological instability, countries that break from the illusion of purely technical solutions will gain a decisive strategic advantage.

The question is no longer how much water can be stored behind dams, but how long water can remain alive in the landscapes themselves.Email