In March, Uganda’s cultural landmark, the Kasubi Tombs, were destroyed in a suspicious fire. Tensions spilled over when Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni paid a visit to the Bugandan site and found his entrance blocked by an angry crowd. According to an independent newspaper, soldiers accompanying the president opened fire, killing three civilians.

With ethnic-tinged unrest and student protests in Kampala, as well as cross-border conflicts in the north and east, Museveni, who has led Uganda since 1986, is facing a potentially serious test as elections approach early next year. The country’s demographic profile, and in particular the lack of opportunities for growing numbers of young people, will add to the country’s challenges, as I argue in a new case study of Uganda’s demography.

Uganda has the youngest population in the world, with 77 percent of its people younger than age 30. Women in Uganda have an average of 6.7 children each and 41 percent of married women have an unmet need for family planning. The population of Uganda is currently growing by about one million people per year, and given the force of its demographic momentum, Uganda’s population is likely to almost double by 2025 even if fertility declines.

Population Action International has found that countries with age structures like Uganda’s are the most likely to experience internal strife and autocratic governance. Between 1970 and 2007, 80 percent of outbreaks of civil conflict occurred in countries in which 60 percent or more of the population was younger than age 30.During that same period, 90 percent of countries with an age structure like Uganda’s had autocratic or only partially democratic governments.

Demography alone does not cause conflict. Most governments, even those with youthful populations, do not become entrenched in internal violence and upheaval. But age structure affects a country’s vulnerability to conflict, due to the demands a government faces in providing for its growing numbers.

In Uganda, young people face diminishing prospects in agriculture, the primary industry, as plot sizes shrink with each successive generation. At projected population growth rates, land density may increase 350 percent by 2050, from 122 inhabitants per km2 to a possible 551 inhabitants per km.

Only one-quarter of students who enroll in primary school reach the final grade, and even those with university degrees find few jobs. A reported youth unemployment rate of 22 percent is even higher in urban areas.

After 25 years in power, President Museveni will stand for a fourth official term in 2011. Despite growing dissent among his constituents, he appears confident of keeping his seat. Regardless of what happens next year,Uganda’s leaders must firmly commit to addressing their country’s demographic issues.

Age structure can become a window of opportunity if youth are engaged in society and couples can choose the number of children they can support. But in Uganda, that window remains far out of reach.

Three new case studies from Population Action International on Haiti, Yemen and Uganda examine the challenges specific to countries with very young age structures and recommend policy solutions.
Elizabeth Leahy Madsen is a senior research associate at Population Action International (PAI). She is the primary author of the 2007 PAI report The Shape of Things to Come: Why Age Structure Matters to a Safer, More Equitable World.

Photo Credits: “Atanga.pater.uganda,” courtesy of flickr user Kcarls.

“It was pretty much a normal day in Afghanistan on Monday.

“A couple of civilian casualties caused by insurgents. More investigations into corrupt former ministers. The opening of six new projects in Herat Province by the Italians and the Spaniards, which are the NATO countries in the lead in western Afghanistan. All right, not six, projects, but two or three, and the Spanish announced a pistachio tree-growing program to replace poppies. Pistachios, poppies… maybe pine nuts will be next.”

— At War: An Airborne Afghan Folk Tale, Alissa J. Rubin, New York Times, April 1, 2010

Though only earning a glancing mention in The New York Times, it is heartening to see a response to the environmental and economic loss of Afghanistan’s once abundant wild pistachio forests. As a result of wide-spread environmental mismanagement and war, the past 30 years have seen a dramatic decline in the wild pistachio woodlands native to Northwestern Afghanistan.

The journal Nature Geoscience recently published a study comparing the impacts of rural and urban population growth on deforestation. “Deforestation Driven by Urban Population Growth and Agricultural Trade in the Twenty-First Century” finds deforestation is positively correlated with urban population growth and agricultural exports to international markets. In rural areas, however, the link between deforestation and population growth was absent, indicating that urbanization and agricultural export-oriented economies were the primary drivers for forest loss. The study concludes that, rather than focusing on the activities of rural populations, deforestation reduction efforts should target “industrial-scale, export-oriented agricultural production, concomitant with efforts to increase yields in non-forested lands.” (SUBSCRIPTION ONLY)

According to the United Nations, 74 million acres of farmland in the developing world were acquired by foreign governments and investors over the first half of 2009 – an amount equal to half of Europe’s farmland.

Some advocates of geoengineering have touted fake, plastic “trees” as a promising technology for absorbing carbon. But other experts are promoting a solution that also filters water, encourages rainfall, prevents erosion and desertification, offers economic opportunities, and provides a vital source of food for a growing global population: real trees.

“Water shortages,” warns South Asia scholar Anatol Lieven, “present the greatest future threat to the viability of Pakistan as a state and a society.

This warning may be overstated, but Pakistan’s water situation is deeply troubling, as described in a new report from the Woodrow Wilson Center’s Asia Program, Running on Empty: Pakistan’s Water Crisis.

Water availability has plummeted from about 5,000 m3 per capita in the early 1950s to less than 1,500 m3 per capita today. As Simi Kamal reports in the first chapter of Running on Empty, Pakistan is expected to become “water-scarce” (below 1,000 m3 per capita) by 2035—though some experts project this could happen in 2020, if not earlier.

In an unstable nation like Pakistan, water shortages can easily become security threats. In April 2009, alarm bells sounded when the Taliban pushed southeast of Swat into the Buner district of the Northwest Frontier Province. Not only is Buner close to Islamabad, it lies just 60 kilometers from the prized Tarbela Dam, which provides Pakistan with billions of cubic meters of precious water for irrigation each year.

Soaked, Salty, Dirty, and Dry

According to Kamal, Pakistan faces significant and widespread water challenges:

• Inefficient irrigation.
• Abysmal urban sanitation.
• Catastrophic environmental degradation.
• Lack of water laws to define water rights.
• Lack of a sound policy on large dams.

An arid country dependent on agriculture, Pakistan allocates more than 90 percent of its water resources to irrigation and other agricultural needs. Unfortunately, intensive irrigation and poor drainage practices have waterlogged and salinized the soil.

Women and Water in Rural Pakistan

Rural women and small farmers are particularly affected by Pakistan’s water crisis. Women bear the primary responsibility for obtaining water, but have been traditionally been shut out of government water-planning and decision-making processes. However, government and media initiatives, described by Sarah Halvorson in Running on Empty’s chapter on water and gender, are increasingly highlighting the importance of women’s participation.

Meanwhile, Adrien Couton reports that Islamabad’s water projects mainly benefit large and wealthy farmers—even though Pakistan has approximately four million farms smaller than two hectares.

Pakistan’s Thirsty Cities

With most of Pakistan’s water dedicated to agriculture, less than 10 percent is left for drinking water and sanitation. A quarter of Pakistanis lack access to safe drinking water—and many of them reside in the country’s teeming cities.

Worse, the drinking water that does exist is quickly disappearing. Lahore, which relies on groundwater, faces water table declines of up to 65 feet, as described by Anita Chaudhry and Rabia M. Chaudhry in their chapter on the city.

The scarcity of clean water in the cities—exacerbated by a lack of wastewater treatment—is a leading cause of deadly epidemics. At least 30,000 Karachiites (of whom 20,000 are children) perish each year from unsafe water.

Pakistan Must Act Now To Solve the Water Crisis

Pakistan arguably has the technological and financial resources to provide clean water. So what’s the hold-up? In her chapter on public health, Samia Altaf argues that the problem is the absence of a strong political lobby to advocate for water—and that no one holds Islamabad accountable for fixing the problem.

The report offers more recommendations for addressing Pakistan’s water:

• Invest in existing infrastructure and in modest, indigenous technology.
• Strike appropriate balances between centralized and decentralized management.
• Devote more attention to water allocation and distribution on local/individual levels.
• Understand the links between agricultural and urban water pressures.
• Embrace the role of the private sector.
• Conserve by favoring water-saving technology; less water-intensive crops; and water-conserving urban building design.
• Address structural obstacles like systemic inequality and gender discrimination.
• Take immediate action. Tremendous population growth and rapidly melting glaciers in the Himalayas ensure that the crisis will deepen before it eases.

The need for immediate action cannot be overstated. While Pakistan’s water crisis may not threaten its viability, it is undeniable that so long as the crisis rages on, essential components of the nation—such as the vital agricultural economy, the health of the population, and political and economic stability—lie very much in the balance.

Michael Kugelman is the Wilson Center’s South Asia specialist. He is co-editor, with Robert M. Hathaway, of the recently published Wilson Center book Running on Empty: Pakistan’s Water Crisis, on which this post is based. Much of his work has focused on resource shortages in Pakistan and India.

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In an Economist.com debate on population growth between John Seager of Population Connection and Michael Lind of the New America Foundation, Seager argues that rapid population growth is “the source of many of the world’s—especially the poor world’s—woes,” as it accelerates environmental degradation and “undermines both security and development.” On the other hand, Lind counters that “countries are not poor because they have too many people,” and asserts that “technology and increased efficiency have refuted what looks like imminent resource exhaustion.”

Christian Aid’s “Growing Pains: The Possibilities and Problems of Biofuels” finds that “huge subsidies and targets in developed countries for boosting the production of fuels from plants such as maize and palm oil are exacerbating environmental and social problems in poor nations.”