Water torture in Gulf Countries

Gulf governments need to ramp up investment in their water industries to avoid severe shortages in the future.

People dying of thirst, mothers fighting to give their children a drink, countries going to war over control of the rivers that cross their borders. It is an apocalyptic vision of the future - the stuff of Hollywood blockbusters.

But it may not be far from the reality that the world faces over the next 40 years, according to many water specialists who say that global water shortages are already threatening economic growth as well as geo-political stability.