Soil and Water Resources of South Asia in an Uncertain Climate

I. INTRODUCTION The South Asia region consists of seven countries, namely Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. The region's land area of 514 million hectares (Mha), or 3.8% of the world area (Fig. 1), is home to more than 22% of the world's population. Total arable land area of the region is 203 Mha, or 14.7% of the world's total, and the irrigated land area is 81.7 Mha, representing 30.1 % of the world's irrigated land area (Table 1).