WMO report: Global water reserves are shrinking

GENEVA - Global water resources have become scarcer in recent years, with river flows declining, glaciers shrinking and groundwater levels falling in many regions, according to the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO).

Central and Eastern Europe were particularly affected by low groundwater levels in 2025, the WMO said in its annual State of Global Water Resources report released on Thursday.

Few other regions recorded such a large deficit compared with the 2014-2024 period, while groundwater levels across much of Northern Europe were above the long-term average.

Human-induced climate change, rising demand for water from a growing global population and natural variability were all contributing to changes in water resources, said Wayne Jenkinson, director of the WMO's Hydrology and Cryosphere division.

Water storage has been shrinking steadily for more than a decade, the WMO said.

This includes groundwater as well as water stored in lakes, glaciers, soils, vegetation, snow and ice.

WMO Secretary-General Celeste Saulo compared these reserves to a savings account that could previously help make up for a drought season.

"We are depleting that savings account,” she said.

Almost two-thirds of monitored wells had less water last year than the long-term average, according to the report.

The volume of water flowing through rivers worldwide was also unusually low in 2025, which the WMO said was one of the three years with the lowest river discharge in the past 35 years. - BERNAMA