ABSTRACT
Water is as essential to economies as it is to human life. Clean drinking water is needed for the health of productive populations, but only 10 percent of global water use is actually for household consumption. Agricultural water is needed to produce food and fiber. Water is a direct input in virtually all industrial production processes, and it is needed to produce hydropower and to cool thermal power plants, which together account for the vast majority of world energy supplies. In lakes and rivers it is used for transportation, fisheries, and recreation.
