Water Scarcity: Profit From A Multi-Generational Trend…
Do you sometimes feel a bit… shall I say… crowded?
I know I do.
Having grown up in a small rural Montana town, I’m used to a small smattering of people and a lot of wide-open spaces. In fact, the town I grew up in only has around 800 people who call it home.
And in the surrounding countryside, there are more cows than people… by a long shot.
That’s a far cry from where I live now…
I moved my family to Phoenix a few years ago. And there’s an estimated 4.2 million people living in the “Valley Of The Sun”. That’s over 4x the number of people living in the entire state of Montana!
And it seems like I’m stuck behind every one of them on my drive to the office in the morning.
Sigh…
No doubt about it, there’s a lot of people running around these days. In fact, the world crossed an important threshold earlier this week…
According to the United Nations, there are now seven billion people inhabiting the earth. That’s up from two billion in 1927, four billion in 1974, and six billion in 1999. It doesn’t take a trained eye to see human population has exploded in the past 80 years.
But that’s just the start of it…
Experts estimate global human population will grow to eight billion by 2024 and ten billion around 2083. Clearly, a lot of people are going to need clean water and food in coming years.
But concerned scientists are wondering… where’s it going to come from?
Resource depletion is already a growing issue as global population swells. Things many of us take for granted like water and food are a scarcity for millions of people. In fact, according to the World Health Organization, water scarcity affects 1 out of every 3 people on every continent.
And lack of water leads to food shortages…
Falling water tables in the world’s largest grain producing countries (US, China, and India) has put pressure on global grain supplies in recent years. In fact, the 2008 food crisis was a direct effect of droughts and rising oil prices.
Without ample water to grow food and cheap energy to harvest it, food prices can quickly rise to unaffordable levels for a large percentage of the world’s population.
What’s all this worrisome news mean for investors?
First of all, my point in bringing up all these unnerving facts isn’t to scare you. It’s simply to make you aware of the immense investment opportunities coming our way.
You see, one of mankind’s most valuable assets is our ability to innovate. And there’s no doubt about it, we’ll need a heavy dose of innovation in coming years.
To solve the world’s water problems, we’ll need revolutionary technology. Maybe it’s desalination technology that can turn seawater into freshwater quicker and more efficiently.
One thing’s for certain…
The innovations helping to solve the world’s water problems will need to be financed. And there’s one place that companies go to get boatloads of capital… the global equity markets.
That means investors like you and me will have a front row seat to some of the most exciting profit opportunities in history.
Is there a way to invest in the growing need for clean water right now?
One of the easiest ways is through the PowerShares Water Resources Portfolio (PHO). This ETF holds a handful of global companies focusing on making clean water available to the masses.
Keep a close eye on this growing trend. One day we may find the global water industry is one of most valuable on the planet.
Category: Stocks
