Water: A Resource Critical to Food Production and Survival

Fresh water is a limited and valuable natural resource that is crucial to human health and survival. Poor quality water continues to result in human illness and disease despite microbial and chemical quality standards for water used for both drinking and in food production. These standards are both inconsistently formulated and irregularly enforced. Factors limiting water availability and impacting water quality include an expanding global population, climate change, aging infrastructure, and industrial uses.