Water Resources Policy for the Brazilian Semiarid Region

Water Desalination

Due to the bad quality of the water in existing wells, during the last years, many desalination equipments by reverse osmosis were installed in Brazilian semiarid region. The Sweet Water Program (Programa Água Doce - PAD) is an action of the Federal Government coordinated by the Ministry of the Environment, through the Secretary of Water Resources and Urban Environment, in partnership with federal, state, municipal and civil society institutions.
According to Ministry of the Environment (2016), PAD aims at establishing a permanent public policy of access to good quality water for human consumption, promoting and disciplining the implementation, recovery and management of environmental and socially sustainable desalination systems to serve, as a priority, low-income populations in diffuse semiarid communities.
Launched in 2004, the PAD has six components: management, research, desalination systems, environmental sustainability, social mobilization and production systems. The management component is responsible for the training of human resources, elaboration of technical and environmental diagnostics, maintenance and operation of the systems, as well as support for systems management and maintenance.

The research component aims at optimizing production systems by generating new knowledge about halophyte plants, animal nutrition and fish farming.

With the commitment to guarantee the sustainable use of water resources, and promote the coexistence with the semiarid region in an environmental and socially sustainable way, the PAD benefits approximately 100 thousand people in 154 locations in the Northeast, expanding its actions to guarantee access to the water of diffuse communities in the semiarid region (Ministry of the Environment, 2016).
Notwithstanding desalination plants showing effective in providing potable water there are problems that need to be managed: disposal of the refuse originating from the desalination, the high cost of maintenance and the logistics of a complex operation.

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