Water is the world’s most precious resource. Healthy freshwater ecosystems underpin our societies and economies and are central to tackling the global climate and nature crises. Yet they have been consistently undervalued - fuelling their destruction and exacting a profound toll on people and planet.

Now for the first time, we have an estimate of the economic value of water and freshwater ecosystems. And it’s huge.

Extreme floods and droughts are wreaking ever increasing havoc. Freshwater biodiversity is in freefall. We urgently need to transform the world’s approach to water - and the freshwater ecosystems that store and supply it.

But this figure pales in comparison to the indirect value of freshwater ecosystems.

Our new report estimates that their direct economic value for our households, agriculture, businesses and industries is a minimum of US$7.5 trillion per year. Equivalent to 7% of global GDP - or the combined GDP of Germany and France.

The risks are clear. And so is a central part of the solution - protecting, restoring and sustainably managing freshwater ecosystems to accelerate adaptation to the worsening water-related impacts of climate change.

Growing populations and economies will further strain already stressed freshwater ecosystems. While climate change will also exacerbate the crisis as its impacts will primarily be felt through water with dry areas becoming drier, and wet areas wetter.

2/3rds of recent natural disasters have been water related. And the forecast is for even more extreme floods, droughts and storms.

While shifting rainfall patterns and river flows will impact water supplies as well as rain-fed and irrigated agriculture. And the resilience of businesses and entire economies.

Overall, rivers support 1/3rd of global food production. While much of this is irrigation, rivers also sustain freshwater fisheries that feed 200 million people, including Indigenous Peoples and local communities across Africa, Asia and Latin America. And agriculturally rich deltas, including some of the great rice baskets of the world. But despite all this, the world remains largely blind to the bigger picture. So we have failed to prioritize the health of our rivers, lakes, wetlands and aquifers. And created this global water crisis.

But 75% of irrigated crops are already grown in water-stressed areas. And this figure is rising, especially as unsustainable irrigation is making the situation worse – drying up rivers and lakes and emptying aquifers. But the critical importance of healthy freshwater ecosystems to ensuring that the world can sustainably feed up to 10 billion people extends beyond irrigation.

Freshwater ecosystems are the most threatened across the globe. And the threats will only increase unless we start factoring in all the diverse values of these ecosystems – our freshwater life support systems – into development decisions.

Yet these essential benefits continue to be undervalued and overlooked. Decision makers can’t seem to see the freshwater ecosystems for the water. Viewing rivers as mere pipes, wetlands as just wastelands to be converted, and aquifers as resources to pump and pollute without problem. But this blinkered approach has caused huge problems - for all of us. Because at the heart of the world’s water crisis is the degradation of our rivers, lakes, wetlands and aquifers. We’ve lost 1/3rd of our remaining wetlands in the last 50 years, while only 1/3rd of long rivers are still free flowing.

Decision makers have always focused primarily on extracting water, while overlooking the other, diverse values of healthy freshwater ecosystems. Like natural defenses against extreme floods and droughts. Water purification and storage. Sediment flows that sustain mangroves and keep densely populated deltas above the rising seas. And their critical role in sustaining not just freshwater biodiversity but nature on land and sea.

Freshwater ecosystems are biodiversity hotspots - home to 10% of all known species despite covering just 1% of the Earth. Incredibly, one third of vertebrate species – including more than half of all known fish species – are supported by freshwater habitats. But 1/3rd of freshwater species are now threatened with extinction. And freshwater species and ecosystems are the most at risk globally.

There is growing awareness of the global nature crisis. But the world has still not woken up to the central role of freshwater ecosystems in driving the crisis – and solving it.

And it’s not just freshwater species that are at risk. Freshwater ecosystems are also critical for the health of countless species on land and in the sea - particularly rivers which connect the two.