Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Members of the committee, thank you for inviting me to appear before you.

Thank you also for underscoring the significant role that water and agriculture can play in shaping Canada's foreign policy.

My name is Chandra Madramootoo. I am a distinguished James McGill professor at McGill University.

I have been fortunate to undertake an array of projects on water, agriculture and the environment over four decades in several regions of the world. I will focus my intervention on three interlinked areas: water and food security; peatlands and wetlands protection; and peace and security in transboundary basins.

Agriculture uses about 70% of global water withdrawals. In water-stressed basins, such as the Aral Sea and the Nile, agriculture consumes as much as 90% of water supplies to meet irrigation demands. Canada, at one time, was a significant donor to agricultural water projects in developing regions. Sadly, this is no longer the case, and Canada has lost its voice in major water fora dedicated to agricultural water use. Water for agriculture is critical to human livelihoods and socio-economic well-being due to the disasters around climate, rising temperatures and increased greenhouse gas emissions.

First, water security is at the nexus of climate change and national security. The effects of climatic change are already seen through a higher frequency of hydro-climatic disasters, notably floods, droughts and land degradation. The World Bank estimates that roughly 1.6 billion people live in countries with water scarcity, and that number could double in two decades.

The United Nations reports that 258 million people in 58 countries faced acute food insecurity in 2022. Food insecurity is particularly severe in areas experiencing conflict, and it's exacerbated by extreme weather events. It leads to population migration and tensions in refugee camps.

Canada has an obligation to work bilaterally and regionally with humanitarian organizations and multilateral organizations to curb these conflicts induced by water and food insecurity. Canada's innovations in irrigation water management and modern technologies for the drainage of agricultural lands are world-renowned. Canada is well positioned to disseminate knowledge and provide expertise in climate-smart agriculture for food-insecure regions of sub-Saharan Africa, central Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and north Africa. Interventions that build resilience to drought, water scarcity, land degradation and floods—with women at the core—ought to be promoted with our development partners.

It is essential to strengthen existing platforms, such as the global framework on water scarcity in agriculture, WASAG, hosted by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Technical leadership from Canada is urgently sought in the WASAG, aimed at the world's arid and semi-arid regions where the poorest of the poor reside.

Second, one-third of global peatlands are in Canada, covering about 12% of the country's land area. They store about 150 billion tonnes of carbon, thus mitigating climate change. Canada's wetlands, covering some 13% of the terrestrial area, are close to one-quarter of the world's remaining wetlands, and together with peatlands, support a rich biodiversity.

However, in many parts of the world, these ecosystems are being drained at alarming rates for economic development and are becoming sources of carbon dioxide and methane. By curtailing unwarranted drainage, altering the hydrologic cycle and implementing large-scale wetlands restoration, we can slow carbon dioxide and methane emissions and mitigate the impacts of temperature rises.

Canada is a leader in the development and deployment of environmental monitoring technologies. It is recommended that Canada establish an international observatory to advise on wetlands restoration, including how to balance the hydrology, soils and gas fluxes to mitigate climate change.

Finally, transboundary waters account for 60% of the world's freshwater flows, with some 153 countries having territory within at least one of the 286 transboundary basins. Many of these basins are in regions of water scarcity, food insecurity, environmental degradation and political conflict. The Nile, the Zambezi, the Aral Sea and the Amazon are just a few.

Competing economic interests and rising nationalism are at the heart of transboundary conflicts—