Kampala — Water scarcity is likely to hit Uganda by 2035, according to the 2009 review report by the Ministry of Water and Environment.

Per capita water availability will drop to 896 cubic meters per year, below the international threshold of 1,000 cubic meters. Water stress will hit Uganda even earlier, by the year 2020. The available water will have dropped to 1,480 cubic metres per person, per year, by then, down from the current 2,000 cubic meters.

The report attributes Uganda's future water problems to high population growth and economic development. "Although Uganda currently has ample freshwater resources, the per capita availability will decrease as population increases and with development, particularly agriculture and industrial production," it states.

Uganda's population growth is the third highest in the world, after Niger and Yemen. Each Ugandan woman has produced an average of seven children since 1969. If current trends continue, the population will reach 60 million by 2030.

Although water consumption in Uganda is low compared to other countries, the use of water for production purposes, given the rapidly rising population, will have implications on the overall water resource, the report shows.

Water constraints are not the only problems Uganda is facing as a result of high population growth. Deforestation is another problem. Clearing of forests to make way for farmland has led to a decline in woodland cover from 16.5% in 1990, to 11.5% in 2005.

Uganda's land under small-scale farming increased from 35% to 37% over the same period. However, the share of agriculture to GDP is going down, the report points out. It also notes that productivity is low. Crops and livestock yields are only a quarter to half of what could be achieved.

"Stagnant agriculture, coupled with a rising population, means more land had to be converted to farmland to meet the growing need for food."

This, the report adds, will lead to more encroachment on forests and wetlands.Forests are also being felled to meet the demand for firewood and construction materials for a growing urban population.

Although Uganda is able to sustainably harvest 53,000 cubic metres of timber from its central forest reserves, the present demand is almost 15 times as high, says the environment ministry.

The report lists Wakiso, Mubende and Mityana as districts that lost over half of its forests since 1990, while Mayuge has lost all of its forest cover. Quoting the Food African Organisation, the report warns that more than 80% of Uganda could become a desert in less than 50 years.

"At the present rate of deforestation, it is predicted that Uganda is likely to be importing fuel wood by 2020. Massive deforestation affects the rain cycle and leads to soil erosion and landslides, particularly on hill slopes.

"The knock-on effect of soils being washed away is loss of agricultural land, declining fertility and contamination of water resources with silt," the report notes.

Land degradation will in turn lead to a decline in individual incomes, while silt-laden rivers will make the water unfit for human consumption. Uganda needs to advocate for population control, the report concludes. It refers to Kenya which had set a target to stabilise the fertility rate at 2.1 by 2010.

"Ideally, the rate of population increase should be such that it allows the environment time to adjust and continue to provide critical services sustainably," the report notes.

"However, it would appear that the current rate of population growth in Uganda is too high for this." If the population growth rate is not reduced, the ministry predicts, "rapid and widely-shared economic growth will be difficult, if not impossible, to achieve."

The report warns that if the trend is not reversed, "it is simply unavoidable that future generations in Uganda will suffer tremendously."