When Delhi Water Minister Atishi ended her hunger strike last month after her health deteriorated, she had exposed more than India’s domestic water crisis. Her desperate protest over Haryana state withholding 110 million gallons daily from the Yamuna river revealed the first major economic disruption driven by resource scarcity rather than financial markets. While others report on local shortages, the reality is far more consequential—India’s water crisis is triggering global supply chain relocations, agricultural disruptions, and geopolitical dependencies that will reshape international commerce.

India’s water crisis reveals why global manufacturers are quietly relocating production. The water supply is projected to decline to 1,367 cubic meters per capita by 2031, well below the 1,700 cubic meter threshold that defines water stress. For context, this represents a 60% decline from current levels in a country where manufacturing jobs have already begun disappearing due to companies’ inability to access clean water. The exodus is most visible in water-intensive industries, such as the thermal power sector. Thermal coal power plants, which consume vast quantities of water for cooling, face operational shutdowns during droughts when drinking water takes priority. Similarly, steel manufacturers, textile producers, and chemical companies are realizing that water scarcity creates production bottlenecks that no amount of capital investment can solve. When Moody’s warned that water-dependent sectors would face “operational disruptions that hinder revenue growth,” they described a fundamental shift in global manufacturing geography.