Water, Climate, and Environment: Beyond Iraq’s obvious conflicts

art by Lynn Finnegan (Ireland)

Tobias von Lossow (Clingendael Institute and IHE Delft); Peter Schwartzstein (CCS and Wilson Center); Hassan Partow (UNEP)

Environmental momentum offers a pathway for a new Iraqi Peace.

Context

After more than 40 years of intermittent conflict, dictatorship, and foreign intervention, Iraq is riven with socio-economic crises, sectarian and ethnic tensions, and fraying social cohesion, some of which risk contributing to further violence. Since the territorial defeat of the so-called Islamic State (IS) in 2017, however, Iraq has experienced few major hostilities, though the extremist group continues to terrorize certain areas. As job prospects and the quality of basic services have deteriorated, popular anger has spilled into protests against a political class and system that many Iraqis distrust and see as incapable of meeting the population’s needs. Global and regional geopolitical tussles are adding to the fragility of an increasingly tenuous-looking peace.  

Against this backdrop, Iraq is experiencing some of the region’s most debilitating resource, climate, and environmental woes, which are exacerbating existing crises. Severe drought has compounded the failure of water supply services in the south. Extreme heat, which sometimes tops 50 C, is overtaxing an electricity network already unable to meet demand, repeatedly plunging millions into dangerous temperatures without relief. The combination of water shortages, climate change, and environmental degradation is directly threatening people’s lives and livelihoods and has helped to spur instability and mass mobilization, notably in Basra in 2018. Many Iraqis increasingly struggle with heat-related sickness or respiratory ailments as dust and sandstorms intensify. Farming and fisheries, the bedrocks of the rural economy and vital planks in the state’s bid to diversify away from the oil sector, are wavering in tougher conditions.

Between wildfires and infrastructure-eating floods in the north, and a particularly egregious water situation in the south, few people remain unaffected by these changes. Though the intensity and nature of environmental degradation vary across the country, these issues cut across sectarian, ideological, geographical, and socio-economic lines in ways that few other topics do. As a result, there are many opportunities for country-wide dialogue that can contribute to the peacebuilding efforts across Iraq.

Obstacles

The potential for environmental grievances to rally diverse political constituencies can prompt blowback from the state and non-state security actors, particularly as climate stresses become more pronounced. The political setting is becoming harsher for environmental civil society in Iraq, with many of its activists regarded with suspicion by militias and certain elements of the security services, not least because of their association with the 2018-2019 protest movement. Some have been intimidated, a number arrested, and at least one murdered in Basra for reasons that were at least partly related to her campaigning.

Environmentalists have enjoyed little success in bringing together the numerous ministries and other government bodies whose responsibilities relate to the environment. Achieving this would require Iraqi policies to mainstream an environmental agenda, strengthen corresponding capacities, and develop relevant policies. Generally, environmental challenges and disasters need to be recognized as pressing problems with a major bearing on national security, not exceptional crises to be fobbed off with quick fixes. Another obstacle is that some see an environmental agenda as a threat to the oil sector, which bankrolls over 90 per cent of the government budget and provides some of the country’s scarce jobs.

What’s been done

The Iraqi government appears eager to tackle environmental challenges. It ratified the Paris Agreement in January 2021, endorsed its Nationally Determined Contribution in October 2021, and has welcomed foreign assistance in addressing its water crisis. Leading politicians, such as President Barham Salih, have repeatedly stressed the gravity of the country’s climate and resource challenges, though this also redirects popular rage away from Baghdad. The uncertain long-term outlook for fossil fuels makes the transition to a green and climate-resilient economy an opportunity for Iraq to usher in new jobs, improve health and living conditions, and promote stability.

On a civil society level, too, momentum is building. Environmental initiatives have been established; older civil society organizations have expanded into ‘green’ campaigning; and the country has a growing cohort of environmentally interested journalists. Although crises are often perceived as isolated challenges and the environmental movement remains fractured and weak, activists are developing pan-Iraqi networks. There are initiatives to educate campaigners from different governorates about one another's challenges, such as by taking Kurdish environmentalists to the marshes in the south and vice versa. Environmental NGOs are orchestrating workshops, for example, on the use of drip irrigation and other water-saving techniques. 

The continuing fallout from the emergence of IS has drastically illustrated the extent to which Iraq’s stability is contingent on a healthy natural world. Having first taken advantage of battered agrarian communities to bolster its ranks, the group then used water as a weapon to achieve political and military goals, before laying waste to swathes of farmland as it retreated. The environmental toll of the conflict and successful efforts to rehabilitate some of the most devastating damage, such as around the oilfields at Qayyarah, have underscored how salvaging the environment can yield economic rewards while allaying some local grievances.

Looking ahead

Still a nascent concept, environmental peacebuilding in Iraq is likely to grow in significance.Locally led and internationally supported environmental initiatives need to be integrated into broader stabilization and recovery efforts in conflict-affected areas, as well as into development and governance programmes for the rest of the country. Environmental peacebuilding can help catalyse action on key issues, such as natural resource management, basic service provision, the return of displaced persons, job creation, grievances over pollution, and (transboundary) cooperation and dialogue, particularly on water. Current sources of instability, water, climate, and environmental issues could turn into desperately needed bridges to a better future.