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Water security in the Niles Basin
24 questions and answers

MiCT The Niles
The Niles correspondents put together some questions and answers about the Nile Basin and water in general.
19.03.2018  |  Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

1.
Q: What requires more water, vegetable 10. or meat production?
A: Meat production requires a much higher amount of water than vegetables. To produce 1 kg of meat requires between 5,000 and 20,000 litres of water whereas to produce 1 kg of wheat requires between 500 and 4,000 litres of water.
Source: Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IME)

2.
Q: Which Nile Basin country has the highest per capita electricity consumption?
A: Egypt’s per capita electricity consumption is more than double the combined per capita electricity consumption of six Nile Basin countries.
Source: Nile Basin Water Resources Atlas

3.
Q: How much water does it take to make one litre of beer?
A: 1 litre of beer requires about 300 litres of water.
Source: Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IME)

4.
Q: How many hours are spent each year collecting water in Africa?
A: 40 billion hours are spent collecting water every year in Africa alone. In just one day, 200 million work hours are consumed by women across the world collecting water for their families.
Source: unicefusa.org

5.
Q: Which sector consumes the most water, industry, domestic or agriculture?
A: Worldwide, agriculture accounts for 70 percent of all water consumption, compared to 20 percent for industry and 10 percent for domestic use.
Source: worldometers.info

6.
Q: Guess how much water was already consumed this year worldwide (millions of litres)?
A: http://www.worldometers.info/water
Source: worldometers.info

7.
Q: How many days would it take by boat 16. (cruising speed 100km/day) to cover the Nile river length?
A: Approximately 67 days. The Nile river length is 6,695 km.
Source: Nile Basin Water Resources Atlas

8.
Q: Where did the granite stones for the great pyramids of Giza come from?
A: The granite stones came from Aswan and had to be ferried down the river, for 934 km, on large barges.
Source: sciencing.com

9.
Q: How many Nile riparian nations have navigable water bodies?
A: Nine of the 11 Nile riparian nations have navigable water bodies and a total of 72 inland water ports with Egypt and Uganda having the highest numbers.
Source: Nile Basin Water Resources Atlas

10.
Q: How much of the earth’s surface is water?
A: About 71 percent of the Earth’s surface is water-covered, and the oceans hold about 96.5 percent of all Earth’s water.
Source: water.usgs.gov

11.
Q: How much water have we lost on Earth in the past 100 years?
A: There is about the same amount of water on Earth now as there was millions of years ago.
Source: dnr.wi.gov

12.
Q: Which Nile riparian state has the highest water demand?
A: The total water demand for municipal and industrial use has been estimated at 12,900 million cubic metres per year for the whole Nile Basin. Nearly 97percent of this demand occurs in Egypt.
Source: Nile Basin Water Resources Atlas

13.
Q: How much fresh fish is produced in the Nile Basin every year?
A: The Nile Basin annual fresh fish production is estimated at 3 million tons of which 57 percent is apportioned to capture fisheries in the lakes and rivers. Egypt has the greatest yield in fisheries production at 50 percent, followed by Uganda 19 percent and Tanzania 12 percent.
Source: Nile Basin Water Resources Atlas

14.
Q: Which of the two contains more water, a jellyfish or a cucumber?
A: A jellyfish and cucumber are each 95 percent water.
Source: fs.usda.gov

15.
Q: How long can a person live without water?
A: A person can live about a month without food, but only about a week without water.
Source: water.epa.gov

16.
Q: In which town do you have to pay more for water, New York or Nairobi?
A: In Nairobi urban poor pay ten times more for water than in New York.
Source: cnn.com

17.
Q: How many countries share the Nile river?
A: Eleven countries share the river: Burundi, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Sudan, South Sudan, the United Republic of Tanzania and Uganda.
Source: Nile Basin Water Resources Atlas

18.
Q: What percentage of the world’s water is drinkable?
A: Nearly 97 percent of the world’s water is salty or otherwise undrinkable. Another 2 percent is locked in ice caps and glaciers. That leaves just 1 percent for all of humanity’s needs – all its agricultural, residential, manufacturing, community, and personal needs.
Source: epa.gov

19.
Q: How many countries share the Lake Victoria shoreline?
A: Three countries; Kenya (6 percent), Tanzania (51 percent) and Uganda (43 percent) share the lake shoreline.
Source: Nile Basin Water Resources Atlas

20.
Q: Which plant, introduced by Europeans, today covers large parts of Lake Victoria?
A: Water Hyacinth: This plant was introduced to Africa by Europeans; it reproduces rapidly and covers large areas of the lake. The dense mat of plants block sunlight needed for survival by the life below the surface.
Source: interesting-africa-facts.com

21.
Q: Through which two major conservation areas runs the Mara River?
A: The Mara River Basin is about 13,750 square kilometres, of which about 65 percent is located in Kenya and 35 percent in Tanzania. The Mara River runs through the Masai Mara Game Reserve on the Kenyan side and the Serengeti National Park on the Tanzanian side, both of global conservation significance.
Source: panda.org

22.
Q: Which of the Big Five species found in the Mara River Basin is the most endangered one?
A: The rhino is the most endangered species of the Big Five. Rhino poaching worldwide hit a 15-year high in 2009. The illegal trade is being driven by an Asian demand for horns, made worse by increasingly sophisticated poachers who are now using veterinary drugs, poison, cross bows and high calibre weapons to kill rhinos. Very few rhinos now survive outside national parks and reserves.
Source: worldwildlife.org

23.
Q: Which Nile Basin country has the highest population?
A: Ethiopia has the highest population (106 million) closely followed by Egypt (99 million) and DR Congo (83 million). Eritrea (5 million), Burundi (11 million) and Rwanda (13 million) have the smallest populations.
Source: worldometers.info

24.
Q: Guess how many hectares are irrigated across the Nile Basin?
A: An estimated 5.4 million hectares of land is under irrigation Nile Basin-wide. Over 97 percent of this area is in Egypt and Sudan. 
Source: Nile Basin Water Resources Atlas

This article is part of:
You think of water when the well is empty.
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