Internationally, a water availability below 1,000 m3 per person per year is defined as water scarcity, while below 500 m3 is considered “absolute scarcity”. Jordan’s lack of water resources impacts the country’s economic growth, political stability and national security, but also public health.

In many ways, past policies and practices have exacerbated the problems of access, abstraction and overuse of this essential natural resource. After decades of relying mainly on supply-side solutions, Jordan has expanded its approaches to addressing these problems.

The Ministry of Water and Irrigation further outlined in 2008 its focus on improving water supply to the domestic and industrial sectors and on reducing demand in the agricultural sector. While in 2013 agriculture still used about 53% of the country’s total water budget,

, in February 2015, the US government provided a grant to the Jordanian government to launch a public awareness campaign in the Zarqa Governorate, in conjunction with water and sewage projects overseen by the Ministry of Water and Irrigation.

After the peace treaty in 1994, the implementation of a canal linking the Red Sea and the Dead Sea became the focal point of Israeli-Jordanian cooperation. In February 2015, Jordan and Israel signed an agreement to implement the first phase of the project at a cost of $900 million over a period of three years.

To understand the complexity of these challenges, it is interesting to look at the Ain Ghazal wastewater and sewage collection and treatment system that was established by the government in 1960s near Amman.

Given the issues discussed above regarding the amount, reliability and quality of surface water sources, the Jordanian population relies mainly on groundwater for its domestic water supply.

Palestinians, mainly from the West Bank, were the first large group of refugees to settle in the kingdom. The main influx of Palestinian refugees occurred after the Arab-Israeli war in 1948 and the Israeli occupation of the West Bank in 1967. They were initially housed in tent camps, which were gradually replaced by brick houses. […]