With the launch of Blue Gold, the European Water Partnership (EWP) is creating a communication platform for the EWP, its members, the European water community, stakeholders and those interested in water at large.
Blue Gold is in important tool in achieving EWP's mission to be an action-oriented forum for all stakeholders including local, national and European governmental agencies, knowledge institutes, business, non-governmental organizations, public and private financial institutions, end-users and civil society groups. It constitutes a platform for exchanging views, finding solutions for water challenges in wider Europe and stimulating cooperation and partnerships.
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Saturday, January 03, 2009
BOURA, 2 January 2009 (IRIN) - As water captured in village wells during the 2008 rainy season runs out or dries up, residents in southern Mauritania are spending more time and travelling farther in their hunt for water. Water gatherers in Boura village, 400km southeast of the capital Nouakchott, told IRIN January means the start of longer water treks.
Herder Alioune Ould Modhi, 29, told IRIN it has become more difficult to find water when he digs his wells. “Before, two or three families could dig one well and there would be enough water for everyone. But now, you may have to dig 10 times to find enough water for those same families.”
Based on a 2008 Ministry of Environment study, water access in Maal – the region encompassing Boura – is a growing problem due to declining rainfall, desertification and the absence of a water distribution network.
Boura includes 13 encampments separated by sand dunes and the occasional desert shrub. Nearly all residents get their water from shallow hand-dug wells. The caked earth is dotted with craters showing attempts to strike water.
In the closest city 80km north, there are also water pumps operating on solar, electric, human and animal power.
Anarchic settlements
Nomadic herders have historically passed through Maal en route south to the Senegal River. But severe droughts of the 1970s and 1980s forced many to abandon nomadic pastoralism; they have since formed or joined some 90 villages in Maal, including Boura.
Along a 3-kilometre walk to find water, herder Modhi pointed out wells he had dug. “There was water here - lots of water. Now there is still the well, but not much water.”
Modhi said starting in January he will go as far as 80km north to a lake in Maal or 80km south to Gorgol near the Senegal River.
The regional prefect, Sidi Ahmed Ould Mouebib, told IRIN an anarchic pattern of rural settlements has increased competition for water. “Villagers refuse to group together to share resources. These villagers did not take into account distance from water sources when they settled down; there was no rural planning.”
Mouebib added that resource demands far outstrip supply. “They each want their own schools, water pumps, health clinics. How do we explain to them there is only limited water that can provide for their needs, and only so far we can distribute it?”
Dirty water
Makeshift wells can be dangerous, and the water unsafe, said Mouebib. “While digging a well last year [in Maal], two people died when the sand caved in. And for those who do successfully dig their wells, the uncovered water is tainted by sand, dead animals, and anything that floats in.”
An October 2008 UN study on the economic cost of environmental degradation said only three percent of the desert country’s water is purified, and that is only in Nouakchott.
Rapid urbanisation has increased the risk of water pollution through faecal-tainted or recycled septic quality water, according to the study.
The study estimated that treatment of waterborne diseases cost the government almost US$15 million a year, based on 2005 health data. Mauritania’s Ministry of Health reported in 2005 more than 120,000 cases of diarrhoea, 4,200 of cholera, and 17,000 of parasitic intestinal diseases. These cases resulted in more than 130 recorded deaths.
More coverage, but not access
In deciding where to build water sources, since the 1980s the government has set as a goal providing “modern” cement-walled enclosed wells and motorised water pumps for communities of at least 150 people, and a water distribution network for groups of at least 500.
Despite government efforts to increase water access dating to 1984 – with more than 3,500 completed or under-construction water sources as of 2004 according to the Ministry of Water and Energy – this coverage has not translated into access for all.
The UN has noted that some water projects have broken down for lack of qualified technicians to repair them, communities have moved or grown, and pumps have become obsolete when the required fuel to operate them became unaffordable.
Day’s work
In Boura, the herder in search of water ended up digging a new well. “If I find water here, I will use it and also share with my neighbour. If I don’t, I will look elsewhere as will my neighbour.”
He found water after digging three metres. Around sunset, Modhi filled plastic jugs with the muddy water, loaded them onto his donkey and started the trip home.
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
As Congress considers legislation to stimulate the nation’s economy, the American Water Works Association (AWWA) and other organizations are urging legislators to allocate at least $10 billion for “shovel-ready” projects for investment in drinking water infrastructure. The expenditure of $10 billion on repairs and improvements to water mains, leaking pipes, water treatment plants, pumping stations, storage reservoirs, elevated tanks, security safeguards, and similar projects would create work for more than 400,000 Americans throughout the economy, including almost 90,000 direct construction jobs.
AWWA is confident that the nation’s drinking water utilities can spend at least $10 billion quickly. This confidence is based upon surveys that we have done of our utility members and surveys by the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies. These independent surveys, combined with analyses by the Association of State Drinking Water Administrators, the United States Conference of Mayors, and others, confirm the need and the ability to spend these funds quickly. Studies conducted by EPA, CBO, and others have consistently shown approximate parity in infrastructure need between drinking water and wastewater utilities.
In addition to directly putting people to work, investments in drinking water infrastructure highly stimulate other economic activity. Water projects depend on American pipe, fittings, cement, aggregates, and other products. The U.S. Conference of Mayors estimates that every job created in rebuilding our water systems creates nearly 3.7 jobs elsewhere, and every dollar invested in water infrastructure adds $6.35 to the national economy. Needless to say, investments in water infrastructure also create lasting benefits by strengthening public health, safety, and our quality of life.
Thursday, December 18, 2008
The Water Footprint Conference is held in London (UK) on 16 and 17 December 2008. The delegates share and discuss various aspects about the impact products have for water use. Not only the direct water use, but also in the supply chain as there is more water involved in the production process than the water that the last manufacturer sees on his water bill. This so-called ‘embedded water’ is taken into account at the water footprint. Corporates are looking into this matter and look for ways to improve.
Arjen Hoekstra (Twente University, The Netherlands) has indicated that for 1kg of refined sugar, 1500l of water is needed in the whole process: growing the sugar canes and the production.
Ulrike Ebert (Coca-Cola), stated that the water footprint is essential for the beverage business, for retail and image perspective. ‘Water is a key resource for us’, she stated. ‘You have to go into the supply chain. There is already much going on in agriculture that you can wrap up. However, the question is the methodology to calculate the reduction of the impact. And there are more aspects to water use as well. Policy, anti-poverty considerations, and the uncertainty what really is affecting climate change.’
Ian Walsh (Cadbury) stresses this a bit: ‘the numbers only may exaggerate and mean not so much. For example, we grow cocoa beans in Ghana where it rains a lot. So we have a high water footprint without actually adding ourselves. If we want to reduce it and close the fields down, the local economy goes bust. What do we want?’
Andy Wales of SAB Miller agrees with this point of view that water is complex. ‘We need to look at strategic, analytic and management level. Because most actual decisions about water use are made locally. We are thinking of starting at a local level and scale up.’
Dave Challis of Kimberly Clark sees water as a part of life cycle management, to be discussed with the supply chain. ‘We are not in favour of labeling on the packages as the numbers don’t mean much for people and the purpose of them is not clear for consumers.’
‘Water is business’, states Claus Conzelmann of Nestlé. ‘Raw materials come from agriculture in the end and raw materials mean business. Therefore, water footprinting is a part of environmental footprinting. We have to look at the matter in a more holistic way.’
John Temple of Unilever thinks that consumers do not have a sense of water stress. ‘We have intensively studied consumer behaviour and this gives us tools to work at the use of our products: do people leave the tap on when cleaning their teeth? Do they have long showers? Would they accept a shampoo that does not require water?’ Unilever needs a flexible suppy chain to realise further improvements.
Commodity
In the afternoon forum, these issues returned as well. Quite some companies consider their raw materials as a commoditiy and do not actually know where they are coming from. Henrik Lampa (Hennes & Maurits): ‘The cotton fields are 6 to 7 steps into the supply chain, we really should have to map them and relate them to water scarcity. Then we need to look into the resources and make that part of the supply more efficient.’ A comparable issue is there with Tate and Lyle as Simon Houghton-Dodd tells. But he also sees a difference in the chain upwards: ‘As we receive quite some questionnaires from clients for their corporate responsibility management, a few years ago this was mainly on the manufacturing: is the building well equipped and clean. Now 80% of the questions is about the sustainability side, and they are getting a wider perspective.’
Also, Simon points at the fact that granulated sugar and caster sugar have different water footprints. Not only because they are different but they are used in a different way. ‘We should take into account the amount of water is needed to bake a cake as well. But again: how do you communicate this complexity to the consumer?’
Chemical Water Footprint
The audience listened to the discussionsSylvain Lhote (Borealis) explained that for the production of plastic pellets, the impact of water is underestimated. Creating an ecological footprint for their plants, Borealis learned that there is a water stress in Sweden, Belgium and the UAE. In Sweden especially because of the interference with other companies that also use water. ‘And how do we make a water footprint calculation if we use other materials like natural gas or nafta for our production because they simply may be cheaper?’
Further on, in a discussion the question of a ‘next step’ was raised. In China, a lot of (food) products come from the north, which is relatively poor in water, to be further treated and consumed in the south. So there was a virtual water flow going up north. The first conclusion was to stop bringing water to the north for growing the products and bring the production of food down south. The Chinese were not in favour of this as this should have a severe impact on the population in the north of China.
And that is one of the interim results – the calculation of the corporate water footprint is not to make in a few days. Arjen Hoekstra expected to need several years to work on a good system that facilitates comparison, calculations and further actions.
On 16 December 2008, the Water Footprin
By Salah Sarrar, Reuters
African states lack the resources to deal alone with climate change and must share water better to feed growing populations, government ministers said at a water conference in Libya on Wednesday.
The world’s poorest continent has failed to feed a fast-growing population due to under-investment, bad farm management and more frequent droughts and floods, leaving it hooked on food imports.
The cost of those imports soared to $49.4 billion in 2008 from $10.5 billion in 2005 as world prices jumped, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.
That has put a massive strain on state budgets in countries that subsidise imports to make them more affordable.
Of 36 countries grappling with food crises, 21 are in Africa and the World Food Programme estimates that nearly a sixth of the world’s population—almost 1 billion people—are hungry.
African officials meeting over three days in the Libyan city of Sirte said governments should redouble a 2003 promise to commit 10 percent of national budgets to boosting farm output, according to their final declaration.
With droughts and flash flooding increasingly common, they called for more modern irrigation systems that store water and channel it where and when it is needed.
They agreed to seal more region-wide deals to share the water stored in rivers, lakes and underground.
Cooperation would be strengthened on weather forecasting and early warning systems to minimize the impact of drought, desertification, floods and pests.
“Together we must find concrete and effective measures to address the issues of water in Africa, in a spirit of shared responsibility,” Jacques Diouf, Director General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, told delegates.
The ministers also decided to establish continent-wide information systems to better coordinate farm output and make commodity trade more efficient.
The skills and the resources to make Africa self-sufficient exist if only governments would cooperate on managing their water, delegates said.
“There are countries that progressed in technology and human resources but have a deficit in natural resources, while others have abundant natural resources and lack the technology and human resources,” said Wafaa Sahli, director of urban development at the Community of Sahel-Saharan states.
Sahli said that only pooling those resources would allow Africa to end persistent food crises.
Africa’s population of 967 million, of whom 53 percent are under the age of 20, is forecast to reach 2 billion in 2050.
Diouf said new water control programmes for African farming would cost $65 billion over the next 20 years.
By Sarah Murray, Financial Times
Given the prominent role of the energy sector in generating greenhouse gases, it is hardly surprising that its use of water has so far received little attention. Yet for energy companies – particularly in the nuclear power sector, which uses huge amounts of water for cooling reactors – sustainable supplies of water are critical to their operations.
When it comes to water for cooling purposes at power generation facilities, the industry returns much of what it uses. However, what is redeposited in open bodies of water by power companies has been warmed by a few degrees, which has a negative impact on fish and other aquatic life.
The problem is exacerbated in places experiencing hot summers. “If you add hot water to a river that is already too hot, fish die off,” says Piet Klop, senior fellow, markets & enterprise programme at the World Resources Institute.
He cites the example of France in the summer of 2003, which was hot and dry, with extremely low river levels. “The water quality deteriorated to the point where power plants had to shut down because they couldn’t dump their cooling water anywhere.”
Oil extraction also places heavy demands on water. Enhanced oil recovery, which increases the amount of oil that can
By Andrea Felsted, Financial Times
Among those companies that stand to lose from global water problems – whether floods, droughts or storms – are insurers.
For the insurance and reinsurance industry the most pressing water-related problem is that from flooding. The UK floods of summer 2007, which cost the insurance industry about £3bn ($4.5bn), underlined the devastation that this can cause.
”Flooding really is the big water-related issue for insurers at the moment,” says James Wallace, corporate responsibility manager at RSA Insurance.
To manage the risks of flooding, insurers and some specialist analysis companies that provide them with services have created complex computer models that calculate the probability of a flood and the claims insurers can expect from such a deluge.
Air Worldwide, a commercial modelling company, recently released its UK flood model. It followed rival Risk Management Solutions, which released its updated UK inland flood model earlier this year.
Until recently, most of the emphasis was on flooding from major rivers. But 2007’s flooding, which was characterised by intense rainfall, highlighted the risks to property away from the main rivers, from tributaries or heavy rain.
Experts estimate that about 40-60 per cent of flood-related claims are from damage to properties in areas away from main rivers.
Rapid rainfall in urban areas also highlights the role that drainage plays in flood events.
Mr Wallace says RSA, which has for the past six years been using a flood map to pinpoint the risk to individual properties, is looking at the role played by drainage, which was a significant factor in the summer 2007 floods.
Simon Black, head of statistics and data at Norwich Union, which also maps flood risk to individual addresses, says its model for river flooding worked well. But it is looking to integrate more information on flooding from surface water into its map.
“While modelling what happens to rivers and coastal waters is a pretty advanced science, modelling surface water is not. It is probably in its embryonic phase,” he says.
But insurers face other challenges when it comes to modelling the risk from flooding, as it can be very difficult to establish the likelihood of a heavy downpour occuring.
Stuart Lane, professor and executive director of the Institute of Hazard and Risk Research at Durham University, says good data on rainfall levels date back only 30-40 years.
But Prof Lane, who is working with insurance broker Willis, says that to work out how likely heavy downpours are to occur, dat
By Sarah Murray, Financial Times
The astonishing growth of the world’s cities in recent years presents often overwhelming challenges for authorities struggling to meet the demands this is putting on supplies of food, energy and housing. Among the toughest of these challenges is the need to ensure that these rapidly rising urban populations have sufficient and sustainable supplies of water.
The sheer scale of development is making this increasingly difficult. Mumbai, Delhi, Mexico City, Sao Paulo, New York, Dhaka, Jakarta and Lagos are all predicted by the United Nations to be “metacities” – home to more than 20m people – by 2020.
“Urbanisation puts huge stress on water,” says Chris Armitage, head of UK at FourWinds Capital Management, a natural resources fund. “As people get richer, they move to cities. They consume more and better foods, which require higher amounts of water, and as the population grows, inexorably, the water demand increases, but at a faster rate.”
Moreover, in developing countries much of the expansion is taking place with little planning in place and regardless of whether or not local and regional water supplies are sufficient to sustain the new suburbs and slums.
At the same time, cli
By Fiona Harvey, Financial Times
Water could not be more vital to achieving economic development.
Without easy access to clean water and sanitation, people face extreme hardship – more than 5,000 children die every day in the developing world from preventable diseases such as diarrhoea, water-borne or caused by poor hygiene. A lack of sanitation is probably the single biggest killer in the world, according to poverty campaigners.
The other problems caused by this lack may be less severe, but still crippling to progress: the days of sickness preventing people from working, the waste of time – and sometimes the danger – involved in fetching water from far away, the high prices paid to street water sellers for poor quality water. Some of the consequences are less obvious: girls in Africa, for instance, often stop going to school when they reach puberty if there are no toilets to give them privacy.
“Water is critical – it is the first thing you need for economic development,” says Miguel Jurado, vice-president and head of international markets at Aqualia, a Spanish water company. “First you need clean water, then energy, then transport and telecommunications. These are the basics for development.”
The United Nations University, in a recent study, said water and sanitation should be the main focus for development aid, as without them, efforts to improve education, health and trade flounder. “Development aid would be much better spent if you tackled the water and sanitation issue first,” says Zafar Adeel, director of the university’s international network on water, environment and health. What good is a school if the pupils are frequently too sick to attend lessons, or miss classes because they have to walk miles to carry water home?
As water and sanitation are so fundamental to human progress, any investment in improving these services pays high dividends. The UN estimates that $1 spent on water and sanitation in developing countries produces $8 to $10 in return in economic development.
Yet the investments needed in this most fundamental infrastructure are not being made.
In fact, rich countries are giving a smaller proportion of their aid budgets to water and sanitation than in the past, according to a recent report by the charities Tearfund and WaterAid. Furthermore, what aid they are giving is all too often focused on the regions that need it least, such as China and the Middle East rather than Africa, where the problem is most severe.
Another problem is that sanitation attracts much less attention than water. The Millennium Development Goals, for instance, which were set up by the UN to try to solve some of the most critical problems in poor nations, call for the number of people without access to clean water to be halved, but have no explicit goal on sanitation – despite the fact that 2.6bn people lack access to decent sanitation, and its lack is a major factor keeping them in poverty.
“It’s unsexy,” says Vicky Cann, policy officer at the World Development Movement, a campaigning group. “Sanitation is not glamorous. It’s something that people don’t want to talk about – there are lot of taboos there. And this is reflected in [rich countries’] political priorities [in their aid budgets].”
As a result, she says, progress on sanitation is “far too slow”. This inaction is holding back poor countries severely.
What can the private sector do to improve access to water and sanitation, and thus economic development, in poor countries?
Some companies, particularly those in the food and drink sector or those with water-related technologies, have chosen corporate social responsibility projects focusing on helping people in poor nations to gain access to the sort of services that rich countries take for granted.
For instance, Diageo runs a Water for Life project i
By Fiona Harvey, Financial Times
In the past three years, it has become commonplace for large public companies to have a climate change strategy, usually involving improvements to their energy efficiency and cutting their greenhouse gas emissions. Few companies, however, have a water strategy.
That may soon start to change. Water receives less attention than other environmental issues such as the climate and pollution, but the problem of water scarcity is at least as important – and, arguably, more pressing – than that of global warming. Water has never been more under threat in modern history: pressure from a rising global population, industrialisation, pollution, and climate change itself are all putting fresh water supplies under strain.
“Water is the single most important chemical compound for the preservation and flourishing of human life,” says Neil Hawkins, vice-president for sustainability at Dow Chemical. “Water is also one of the key enablers of the creation of wealth – and yet today, essential agricultural and industrial processes are impacted by water scarcity.”
More than 1bn people lack access to clean water, and about 2.6bn are estimated to have no sanitation. This situation is getting worse. At the same time as we need to feed and clothe a growing world population, which will require much more fresh water for agriculture, drinking and washing, we are diminishing our water supplies through pollution and wastage.
People tend to use more water as they become more prosperous, but this can spill over into wasteful practices, because in most parts of the world wealthy people pay less for their water than its true worth – even, in developing nations, while the poorest may have to pay many times as much. The overuse of water is evident in countries such as Spain, where golf courses have been blamed for sucking up water and leaving rivers to run dry.
Water subsidies, especially to the agricultural sector, also distort the economics of water, and can encourage wasteful practices – such as spray irrigation, which loses much of the water to evaporation, when drip irrigation would be much more efficient. Corruption in the water industries of the developing world is another serious problem, preventing people having access to water, according to the campaigning group Transparency International.
As if this were not enough, climate change also threatens to cause havoc with water supplies, bringing less water in areas where it is most needed and too much where it is not. Some already dry parts of the world are likely to experience more severe droughts, while other regions will suffer more floods.
Climate change could also mean that developed countries start to face the kind of water problems more familiar in poor regions – floods can easily overwhelm water delivery and sewage services, leaving people without water services, and droughts are also likely to become more frequent, necessitating water-saving measures for households and companies alike.
The result of all these pressures is that many more people now face a scarcity of water, lacking enough to cater for their basic needs – and the situation is deteriorating, say forecasters. “By 2030, the world will use 40 per cent more water than today and nearly half of the world’s population will face severe water stress,” says Michael LoCascio, senior analyst at Lux Research.
If we are to safeguard our wealth and prosperity, taking care of our water supplies will be essential. Agriculture is by far the biggest user of water in the world – about 70 per cent of our fresh water supplies are used in farming. The food and textiles industries are most obviously exposed to problems if their supply dries up: it takes 2,400 litres of water to make a hamburger, and 11,000 to make a pair of jeans.
But other industries also depend heavily on water, for their processes. Semiconductor manufacturers, for instance, are among the biggest industrial users of water. Power generators also require plentiful supplies of water for cooling, and other manufacturers use water for purposes from cleaning to cutting materials.
Moreover, water is a massive business opportunity in itself. The water services industry had a global turn-over of $385bn in 2007, while a further $64bn went to companies selling water-related equipment, according to Lux Research. It predicted that the total revenues from water-related businesses, including bottled water and desalination as well as water and sanitation services, would rise to $961bn by 2020.
“There is a boom in the construction of new assets, and of outsourcing [water management to private companies],” says Antoine Frérot, chief executive of Veolia Water. “The assets are also more complex and more technical than before.”
He sees many opportunities for private companies in the sector, in which they still have a relatively small market share – the majority of water and sanitation systems around the world are still in the hands of the public sector.
Privatising water is often a contentious political issue, however, and some campaigning groups are wary of private companies taking more of a role in delivering water in the developing world, as they say companies are interested only in serving the wealthy sections of the population, leaving the poor without access to water and sanitation. “The private sector has not been interested in poor people,” says Vicky Cann, policy officer at the World Development Movement.
But Mr Frérot argues that private companies are best placed to make the investments required, and that public sector officials can manage the contracts with private companies in such a way as to ensure their social aims are met. “If you have the political will, you can build an equitable model,” he says.
Investors are also taking more interest in the sector, with a crop of water-related funds springing up to help investors gain exposure to the sector.
For instance, this year, Four Winds Capital Management launched the Aqua Resources Fund, the first London-listed fund dedicated to global investments in water, raising €60m (£54m, $81m). Kimberly Tara, chief executive of Four Winds, says the rapid economic growth of countries such as China and India is opening up many opportunities in the water and sanitation sector.
Companies, too, are gradually waking up to the opportunities in better managing their own water usage. Starbucks in the UK and Ireland was attacked by the Sun newspaper this year for its practice, in each outlet, of leaving a tap running constantly for cleaning. It has since stopped.
Other companies have found they can save money by saving water. In the UK this year, a group of 21 of the biggest food and drink companies agreed to cut their water use by 20 per cent by 2020. They included Birds Eye Iglo, Cadbury Schweppes, GlaxoSmith-Kline, Nestle UK, Premier Foods, Tate & Lyle, Unilever and United Biscuits. They are expected to save about £60m in water bills.
B&Q, the retailer, says it managed to save 13.6m litres of water a year and cut its water bill by £25,800 using water metering technology in some of its Scottish stores. Andy Francis, energy manager, says: “As individuals we are all aware of the ways we can use less water – turning off taps, noticing and stopping any leaks, and investing in water-saving devices such as water butts. It is equally important for businesses to take stock and understand the improvements they can make in the way water is used.”
Saturday, December 13, 2008
By Joseph Abrams, Fox News
The United Nations named a “water czar” this week to advise the world body on water policy. And while no one disputes the growing importance of water-supply issues around the globe, some are wondering if they’ve picked the right woman for the job.
Supporters say Maude Barlow of Canada is the perfect choice. “We are just thrilled. We think there’s no one better to fill this spot,” said Wenonah Hauter, executive director of Food & Water Watch, of which Barlow is a board member.
“She has been probably the most outspoken and well-known advocate in making water a human right and making sure that water is in public control, not corporate control,” Hauter told FOXNews.com.
But critics say Barlow, 61, an activist from Nova Scotia with no scientific training, has no place advising the United Nations on hydrological issues. “[She] frequently resorts to hyperventilated or exaggerated claims — she’s convinced the bottled water industry is out to take over the world,” said Tom Lauria, vice president of communications for the International Bottled Water Association.
“She makes such outrageous statements that you wonder why the U.N. would entrust her with even a titular position.”
Barlow has accused major players in the water industry, like Suez Energy and Nestle Water, of violating human rights “in lots of cases” and has blamed them for sickness and death in a number of countries.
In Bolivia, she said, Suez violated a written agreement to put in a waste-water treatment system. “People die because they don’t. Lake Titicaca is dying because they don’t,” she told FOXNews.com. “You’re damn right that’s a human rights violation. I have no trouble saying that whatsoever.”
U.N. General Assembly President Miguel D’Escoto introduced Barlow as his pick for the new position on Tuesday, a step in confronting the pollution and scarcity of water that Barlow calls “the most important human rights and ecological crisis of our time.”
Barlow reiterated that message on the 60th anniversary of the U.N.’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights on Thursday.
“This is a wonderful opportunity to advance a more democratic and transparent method of policy making around water at the global level than now exists. Without water there is no life, water is a public good, and a human right,” said Barlow.
The World Health Organization estimates that at least 3.5 million people die each year from water-related illnesses — including 1.5 million children who die from diarrheal diseases and infections. The U.N. hopes to cut in half the number of people without access to sanitary water by 2015.
Barlow will advise D’Escoto and help craft water policy for the U.N. She is planning an all-day meeting there in February and hopes to organize an international summit in the spring, “to bring some heads of state together to talk about this crisis.
“It is my dream” to have a Rio-like summit for water rights, she said, invoking the 1992 summit in Brazil that set an international climate-change agenda.
At the top of Barlow’s agenda is a push to make access to water a basic right, calling on all nations to take it out of private hands and provide their citizens free and sanitary water. “We want it to be a human right — we don’t want people denied water because they’re too poor to pay for it, which is happening now,” she said.
That would represent a sea change in the way water is procured and distributed, a complete nationalization of resources that, if put into effect, could spell an end to the water industry.
Spokesmen for the industry said the emphasis on ending privatization was misplaced and that they would have preferred an appointee with more knowledge of the workings and infrastructure of the trade.
“Unfortunately if you’re ... [just] going to fight the ‘privatization’ of water throughout the world, it’s a misguided conception,” said Rich Henning, a spokesman for United Water, a U.S. subsidiary of Suez Energy.
“It’s really private companies that supply 90 percent of the world’s technology in terms of water-treatment and distribution systems. It’s really the private sector that has brought the most change to the water systems,” he said.
Barlow says she has refused a salary and will have no staff, hoping to avoid the bureaucratic boondoggle that plagues the U.N.
“I have no intention of hanging out very much at the U.N.... I will still spend 90 percent of my time with the grassroots out on the road,” she said. “I don’t want to get caught in the bureaucracy.”
Barlow sees herself as an activist voice within the U.N., continuing a 20-year career in water activism during which she has written numerous books and led international protests against the World Trade Organizations and the water industry.
She admits her new challenge is daunting and says the U.N. won’t be able to bring about any quick fixes.
“I’m not saying that the moment we have a human right for water, the next day everything will be fine, because it’s not,” she said. “The United Nations cannot force any country to do what it doesn’t want to do. It doesn’t have that power.”
She hopes that increased international pressure will force nations to reconsider selling water rights. “If nothing else,” she said, it would give people “a personal spiritual tool to say we have these fundamental rights” and help water activists make a bigger push worldwide.
Tuesday, December 09, 2008
Guidelines for Drinking-water Quality, Second addendum to the Third Edition, Volume 1, Recommendations.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has today released the web-based version of the Guidelines for Drinking-water Quality, Second Addendum to the Third Edition, Volume 1, Recommendations. This addendum adds to and supersedes information in the third edition of the Guidelines.
Guidelines for Drinking-Water Quality, Second Addendum to the 3rd Edition Volume 1 - Recommendations
In response to feedback received, the second addendum includes more guidance on household water management, rainwater harvesting, vended water, temporary water supplies, and pesticides used for vector control in drinking-water sources. It also includes a series of new microbial and chemical fact sheets. Moreover, “expanded” fact sheets are included for key chemical risks such as arsenic, fluoride and nitrate/nitrite.
Complete Spanish version - Guidelines for Drinking-water Quality, third edition, incorporating first addendum, Volume 1 - Recommendations is now available on line at: Guidelines for Drinking-water Quality - Spanish