The Privatization of Water through the W.T.O

1. The Privatization of Water through the W.T.O By BretWalters

2. Welcome to the world of privatized water, where fresh water is treated like a commodity, traded and sold in the international market to the highest bidder.

3. Why water issues? • "The next wars will be fought over water". • Water will be to the 21st century what oil was to the 20th. • The world bank predicts that two-thirds of the world's population will run short of adequate water in the next twenty years.

4. Water no longer a natural shared resource? • Water is an absolutely essential natural resource. • Ground water is a shared resource. • Growing global trend towards making this a marketable commodity through over exploitation of water resources and privatization of water. • Poor gets alienated from even water - a matter of life and death for many communities.

5. A World Bank 1992 paper entitled "Improving Water Resources Management." The Bank believes that water availability at low or no cost is uneconomic and inefficient. Even the poor should pay.

6. Water And Community Rights • Explores water resource management and its impact on economically poor sections of society • A concern for all groups interested in socio economic change of poorer communities since water is a critical biological need.

7. Implications of water scarcity • Food security. • Education of children. • People's relationship with the environment. • Trans boundary relationships between countries.

8. Problem Areas • Rapid depletion of groundwater • Conflict between human and industrial use of water • Contamination of water due to industrial waste • Depletion and contamination due to unsustainable agriculture • Privatization of water resources

9. Depletion of Groundwater • Over extraction especially by industry has led to severe problems for marginalized communities in different parts of India. • Impact of rapid depletion of groundwater is usually underestimated and even ignored. • Need to be cognizant of often competing demands by industry, irrigation and domestic use.

10. "[Water] is a product which would be free normally, and our job is to sell it" - CEO of a water company.

11. The WTO and GATS • Main function is to eliminate trade barriers even if these are national policies created by democratically elected governments to protect the rights of the citizens or environment. • The necessity tests • One of the conditions GATS places is to test whether a national law is really necessary or if it places an unnecessary constraint on trade as determined by GATS. • Companies can sue governments for making trade restrictive choices even if this choice is better for the environment or country.

12. Influences on Water privatization Policy • The World Bank/IMF pushes privatization of water as a pre-condition for loans. • Guaranteed profit margin to the investing corporation. • They encourage cutting subsidies to those who cannot afford. • In 2000, 12 out of 40 IMF loans had requirements for partial or full privatization of water supply.

13. What is the water sources being privatized? • Major rivers, irrigation sources supporting the livelihoods of small farmers and fishermen living by the banks for centuries. • Water rights are transferred to a private corporation without local community participation who then lose access to it. • The private corporations divert water to large industrial belts and urban areas which can afford to pay for the increased costs.

14. A private company has - • No social obligations to make water available to poorer sections of society, or those in remote locations. • Those who cannot pay for water simply will have to forego it.

15. Water - a fundamental right ? • Access to clean water is a fundamental human right. • Decisions about allocation and distribution should be under democratic public control. • Water should remain a public utility and out of the domain of WTO/GATS, private corporations. • Continued water sales will test the limits of the communities to the globalization gold rush by many corporations.

16. Alternative Approaches • Rain water harvesting • Traditional water harvesting systems • Organic/ natural farming • Community managed water resources

17. Water Conservation Ethic. • Water belongs to the earth and all species. • Water is a finite resource. • Water is a part of an ecosystem, interconnected to land and biomass. It must be left where it is and best protected in natural watersheds. • Polluted water must be recycled. • An adequate supply of clean water is a basic human right. • Citizens and local communities have rights to decisions concerning water use and must be legally empowered. • Economic globalization policies are not water-sustainable.

18. Water Facts • More than five million people, most of them children die every year from illnesses caused by drinking poor quality water. • North Americans use about 5,000 liters of water per person per day! • Millions of people are scrounging for cupfuls of water and morsels of food on a daily basis. • Water sport amusement parks are sprouting all over the big cities and highways of the country

19. Water Facts • In 1994, Indonesia was hit with a major drought, residents’ wells ran dry, but Jakarta’s golf courses continued to receive 1,000 cubic meters per course per day. • In 1998, in the midst of a 3 year drought, the Cyprus government cut the water supply to farmers by 50 percent while guaranteeing the country’s two million tourists a year all the water they needed. • In Lima, Peru, poor people pay as much as $3 for a cubic meter of contaminated water, which is collected in buckets. The more affluent pay 30 cents per cubic meter for treated water provided through taps in the houses. • In Dhaka, Bangladesh, squatters pay water rates that are twelve times higher than what the local utility charges. • Indigenous people have been affected in a particularly brutal fashion by the theft of their water.

21. The End