> Water Is A Basic Human Right - Or Is It?
> By Maude Barlow - Toronto Globe And Mail
> 5-11-00
>
> The World Bank must realize water is a basic human right. Several years ago,
> Ismail Serageldin, vice-president of the World Bank, said that the wars of
> the 21st century will be about water. He was referring to the fact that
> the world is running out of fresh water sources at an alarming rate and that
> conflict over what remains will be inevitable.
> To respond to the crisis, the World Bank has recently adopted a policy of
> water privatization and full-cost water pricing. This policy is causing
> great distress in many third World countries, which fear that their citizens
> will not be able to afford for-profit water. Ironically, this policy has
> also created the first of the "water wars" Mr. Serageldin predicted, the
> bloody civil unrest that plagued Bolivia in recent weeks.
> Two years ago, the World Bank (whose official attends Bolivian government
> cabinet meetings as a full participant) refused to guarantee a $25-million
> (U.S.) loan to refinance water services in Cochabamba, Bolivia's
> third-largest city, unless the government sold the public water system to
> the private sector and passed the costs on to consumers.
> Only one bid was considered, and the utility was turned over to a subsidiary
> of a conglomerate led by Bechtel, the giant engineering company implicated
> in the infamous Three Gorges Dam in China, which has caused the forced
> relocation of 1.3 million people.
> In January, 1999, before the company had even hung up its shingle, it
> announced the doubling of water prices. For most Bolivians, this meant that
> water would now cost more than food; for those on minimum wage or
> unemployed, water bills suddenly accounted for close to half their monthly
> budgets.
> To add insult, the World Bank granted absolute monopolies to private water
> concessionaires, announced its support for full-cost water pricing, pegged
> the cost of water to the American dollar and declared that none of its loan
> could be used to subsidize the poor for water services. All water, even from
> community wells, required permits to access, and peasants and small farmers
> even had to buy permits to gather rainwater on their property.
> The selling off of public enterprises such as transportation, electrical
> utilities and education to foreign corporations has caused a heated economic
> debate in Bolivia. But suddenly, debate turned to protest, and thousands
> took to the streets. A general strike and transportation stoppage brought
> the city to a standstill.
> Polls showed that 90 per cent of the public wanted Bechtel turfed
>out.
> Police reacted to peaceful demonstrations with violence and arrests. In
> early April, President Hugo Banzer, a Pinochet-type dictator during much of
> the 1970s, declared martial law. Activists were arrested in the night; radio
> and television programs were shut down in mid-program. A17-year-old-boy was
> killed by police with a gunshot to the face during a demonstration.
> This is a story unfolding in many parts of the world. Just as the human race
> is beginning to come to terms with the awesome dimensions of the looming
> freshwater crisis, a handful of transnational corporations, backed by the
> World Bank, are moving in on Third World countries and, in the name of human
> charity, commodifying their water for profit.
> The partnership between the World Bank and transnational corporations is not
> at all
> subtle. In March, almost 5,000 people gathered in The Hague for the second
> World Water Forum. Officially sponsored by the United Nations and the World
> Bank, the forum was openly dominated by a handful of huge water and food
> corporations. The Forum was dedicated from the beginning to using the
> growing world water crisis to promote acceptance of the corporate control of
> water. A key dispute was whether water should be considered a "human right"
> or a "human need."
> This was not a semantic exercise. If water is a human need, it can be
> supplied by corporations. It is hard to make a profit on a human right.
> Distressingly, the governments attending, including Canada, sided with the
> World Bank and declared water a human need. Distressingly as well, the
> Canadian
> International Development Agency (CIDA) gave close to $600,000 and full
> support.
> The privatization of municipal water services has a terrible record that is
> well documented.
> Customer rates are doubled or tripled; corporate profits rise as much as 700
> per cent; corruption and bribery are rampant; water quality standards drop,
> sometimes dramatically; overuse is promoted to make money; customers who
> can't pay are cut off. In France, both water giants Vivendi and
> Suez-Lyonnaise des Eaux have been repeatedly cited for corruption. When
> water was privatized in
> Great Britain, water meters were installed in homes and company employees
> shut off service to many thousands of customers who could not pay their
> full water bills. When privatization hits the Third world, those who can't
> pay will die.
> The Bolivia story has a happy ending (for now). By the hundreds of
> thousands, Bolivians marched to Cochabamba in a showdown with the
> government. On April 10, they won. The Bolivian government kicked Bechtel
> out of the country and revoked its water-privatization legislation.
> Oscar Olivera, the humble Bolivian shoe maker who led the fight, brought his
> message to a
> Washington rally during the recent IMF/World Bank meetings. He said that if
> water is privatized and commodified for profit, it will never reach the
> people who need it but serve only to make a handful of water corporations
> very rich.
> There is no way to overstate the crisis of fresh water facing the world
> today. No piecemeal
> solution will prevent the collapse of whole societies and ecosystems. A
> radical rethinking of our values,
> priorities and political systems is urgent and still possible. Water belongs
> to the Earth and all species; no one must be allowed to expropriate it for
> profit.
> Where will Canada stand?
> ........
> Maude Barlow is the national chairwoman of The Council of Canadians and the
> author of Blue
> Gold, The Global Water Crisis and the Commodification of the World's Water
> Supply.
>
> Copyright c 2000 Globe Interactive
> http://www.theglobeandmail.com
> >>
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