Overview

• Roughly 60% of rivers carried too much or too little water in 2024, with only about one‑third of basins near normal levels.
• Scientists link the extremes to record global heat of about 1.5°C above pre‑industrial levels and to El Niño, which boosted evaporation and intensified downpours and drought.
• Floods and droughts caused severe losses, including about 2,500 deaths and 4 million displaced in Africa, Europe’s worst flooding since 2013 with more than 335 deaths and 413,000 affected, deadly inundations in Valencia, and record‑setting floods in southern Brazil.
• An estimated 3.6 billion people lacked adequate water for at least one month in 2024, a figure UN‑Water projects could approach 5 billion by 2050.
• Glaciers lost roughly 450 gigatonnes of ice for a third straight year, threatening long‑term water supplies in glacier‑dependent regions such as Tajikistan, as the WMO presses for better data sharing and sustained investment.