What is virtual water? Why does it matter?

- How can you reduce your virtual water impact?

What is virtual water?  

Virtual water is the volume of water used to produce consumer products. The total volume of water refers to all of the water used in the production of a product. For example, the total volume of water used in a food product would include the water used in the agricultural process, but also the water used in packaging and shipping. Virtual water is essentially all of the “hidden” water behind a product. Every product we consume contains virtual water.

Why should we care?

The majority of the public is unaware of just how much water we consume in our daily lives. It is easy to over-consume, especially when we don’t know just how much we are actually consuming. Without understanding our consumption, it is unlikely that we will succeed in reducing our virtual water footprint. Communities and countries around the world face water issues of scarcity, sustainability, sanitation and accessibility.

Food is the main source of virtual water consumption. In fact, the average American consumes about 33,000 glasses of virtual water every day. These numbers are only expected to increase with increasing populations. Understanding virtual water is a key consideration for sustainable water management.

Explanation: Water covers 70.9 percent of the planet’s surface.

97 per cent of the that water is salt water.

Around the world, 2.1 billion people still lack access to safe water.

Water use is growing at twice the rate of population growth. Unless this trend is reversed and we come up with a way to share water fairly and sustainably throughout the planet, two-thirds of the global population will face water “stress” by 2025

In the USA, the average water footprint per year per capita is as much as the water needed to fill an Olympic swimming pool, an average of 7,786 litres of water per person per day.

In China, the average water footprint is 2,934 litres of water per person per day.

In the Netherlands, 95 per cent of the water footprint of consumption lies somewhere else in the world (due to the amount of imported goods consumed), whereas in India and Paraguay only 3 per cent of the national water footprint of consumption is external.

It requires around 1500 litres of water to produce 1 kilogram of wheat, and a huge 10 times more to produce the same amount of beef.

The water footprint of a cup of coffee is around 140 litres, a cup of tea only around 34 litres.

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