Confronting water
Of all of the social and natural resource crises facing the world today, which lies at the heart of our survival? Fatemah Farag considers the crucial issue of water scarcity
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According to UNESCO, Asia shows the highest number of people unserved by either water supply or sanitation
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"Our discussions will have far more effect on humankind for the 21st century than the current crises in the Middle East or any other political problem of the day." -- William Cosgrove, vice-president of the World Water Council
It was a remarkable assertion for Cosgrove to have made in the days leading up to last week's Third World Water Forum (WWF), held between 16 and 23 March in the Japanese cities of Kyoto, Shiga and Osaka, given the fact that during the forum, the United States and Britain plunged the Middle East into the dark abyss of war. However, if you consider the fact that in only a few years it is projected that a large section of the world's population may not have access to fresh water, the importance of the Japan talks cannot be underestimated -- even during these times of war.
According to WWF organisers, "The council's World Water Forum is the largest international event that seeks to, inter alia: raise the importance of water on the political agenda; support the deepening discussions towards the solution of international water issues in the 21st century; formulate concrete proposals and bring their importance to the world's attention; generate political commitment; and provide space not only for expression of opinions in each individual sector but also for discussions across sectors and regions."
The forum is part of the triennial meetings of the World Water Council (WWC) -- a Paris-based international think- tank established in 1996 and headed by the Egyptian Minister for Water Resources and Irrigation Mahmoud Abu-Zeid. The first World Water Forum was held in Morocco in 1997. At that time, the WWC initiated its "Long-Term Vision for Water, Life and Environment in the 21st Century". In 2000, the second WWF was held in The Hague and launched the "World Water Vision" project. This year, the "Water Voice" project was initiated in an attempt to "solicit grass-roots views on water problems and solutions" as well as to launch the World Water Actions Report.
The WWC does not mince words regarding the importance of their efforts and described the Japan meetings as the "most important international water meeting ever". After all, water has become the new buzz word in development jargon. The WWC itself points to the fact that the number of people expected to be facing water scarcity by 2025 are 2.7 billion people. The United Nations estimates that, in a worst case scenario, seven billion people in 60 countries could face water scarcity. At best, the UN says that two billion people in 48 countries could face water scarcity.
Over the next 20 years, the average supply of water per person is expected to drop by one-third. Today, over 800 million people are hungry because they cannot afford to buy food and over 1.2 billion currently lack access to safe water, while three billion have inadequate sanitation. "The world is in a water crisis that will only grow more acute and devastating in coming years unless governments start giving a higher priority to water in their development and investment plans," argued Cosgrove.
Attended by water specialists from across the globe, the event was an opportunity for UNESCO to launch the United Nations World Water Development Report (WWDR), a collective effort involving 23 UN agencies to provide comprehensive data regarding the state of the world's freshwater resources. The report addresses the sustainable development goals formulated in Rio in 1992 and the targets established by the UN Millennium Declaration of 2000, in which the international community pledged to "afford safe drinking water and to stop the sustainable exploitation of water resources, by developing water management strategies at the regional, national and local levels which promote both equitable access and adequate supplies".
The report outlines the gravity of the situation. "Although water is the most widely occurring substance on earth, only 2.53 per cent is freshwater while the remainder is salt water. Some two-thirds of this freshwater is locked up in glaciers and permanent snow cover," explained the report. "Per capita use is increasing (with better lifestyles) and population is growing. Thus the percentage of appropriated water is increasing. Together with spatial and temporal variations in available water, the consequence is that water for all our uses is becoming scarce and leading to a water crises.
"Freshwater resources are further reduced by pollution. Some 10 million tonnes of waste per day are disposed of within receiving waters... One estimate of global wastewater production is about 1,500 km cube... As ever, the poor are the worst affected, with 50 per cent of the population of developing countries exposed to polluted water sources." People in developing countries suffer from high rates of mortality as a result of poor water sanitation as well as hygiene-associated diseases such as trachoma, a contagious eye disease, life- threatening intestinal infections and schistosomiasis, not to mention the fact that an estimated one million deaths in the year 2000 alone resulted from malaria.
The report said, "In the vicious poverty/ill-health cycle, inadequate water supply and sanitation are both underlying cause and outcome: invariably, those who lack adequate and affordable water supplies are the poorest in society."
Add this to climate change and the situation and management of water resources becomes even more complex. According to the report, "Recent estimates suggest that climate change will account for about 20 per cent of the increase in global water scarcity."
Hence, consider the image painted by Frank Rijsberman, director-general of the International Water Management Institute (IWMI): "If current trends continue, the shortage of water will extend well beyond semi-arid and arid regions. Expanding demand for water will drain some of the world's major rivers, leaving them dry throughout most of the year. Urban centres will experience severe water shortages. But the rural poor will suffer the most serious consequences."
Water scarcity is therefore a problem for all of humanity but one which clearly strikes at the poorest populations more viciously. Water management issues become mines of conflicting interests and require understandings of both problems and solutions.
For example, while the WWF said that this year's report is the result of a comprehensive participatory exercise, and that the WWF itself is a participatory exercise, critics such as the independent Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) claimed that the "bulk of input into the vision exercise came from participants and groups attending the myriad of water-related conferences over the last one and a half years. While these conferences took place in various parts of the world, the majority of the participants of such events were mostly technical advisors, academics, water experts and members of large development agencies and NGOs. People most directly affected by water crises around the world were often marginalised in such events".
Furthermore, for all the rhetoric linking the Kyoto discussions with issues of equity, sustainable development and focussing on the poor, the Observatory fears that "Children's crayon drawings and the many references to gender, community empowerment and land reform help to paint what are far-reaching proposals to expand and reinforce corporate power over the world's water supplies in a more positive and acceptable light."
At the heart of the mistrust and contention is the fact that questions as to how to manage an increasingly diminishing vital life source can no longer be postponed. As WWC President Mahmoud Abu-Zeid said, "Increasing scarcity, competition and arguments over water in the first quarter of the 21st century will dramatically change the way we value and use water and the way we mobilise and manage water resources. Innovative ways of using this precious commodity have to be found to protect ecosystems and ensure food for the billions on this planet."
Privatisation and water valuation are the two mechanisms that have received the most publicity. While to date privatisation is estimated to account for only 10 per cent of the world's water utilities, CEO has noted with alarm that the last decade has witnessed "sweeping privatisation". The Observatory said that "460 million people around the world are now dependent on private water corporations for their supply (up from just 51 million people in 1990). Water industry analysts expect the privatisation frenzy to accelerate and predict the number to reach 1.16 billion people in 2015." This is of particular importance because of the concentration of water business.
According to CEO's figures, the world's largest corporations -- France-based Suez and Vivendi -- already control approximately 70 per cent of the global private markets. Furthermore, the connection between structural adjustment packages in developing countries and water policies irks those who see such packages as being incapable of alleviating the poverty of the South. "After a decade of having privatisation hailed as a panacea for improving access to clean water in the cities of the South, it is now clear that the water TNCs have failed to improve the situation of the poorest. Numerous examples from throughout the South reveal a pattern of gross negligence, failed expectations and broken promises on the part of the global water giants."
According to critics of current water policy trends, the WWF is responsible for promoting the corporate management of drinking water systems around the world.
A concrete example of the obscure nature of privatisation was provided by Radwan Al-Weshah, regional advisor for hydrology and programme specialist in water sciences of the UNESCO regional office in Cairo. "Morocco has one of the worst qualities of water in the world -- 1.36 on our scale for water quality, with the highest rank held by Finland at 1.85. Morocco is also a leader in the region for the privatisation of water services," he told Al-Ahram Weekly. Explaining the discrepancy, he added, "There is usually a conflict of interest between water quality and privatisation. The private sector is in it for profit and the government rarely has much control over a service once it has been fully privatised. Hence, we suggest that the best approach is a private/public partnership."
UNESCO promotes a policy of valuation as opposed to pricing. "Water is not an economic commodity like oil. However, it should have a value -- the value being the cost of the services required to supply water. The value of water is all too often disregarded in business as well as in policy formulation," said Al-Weshah. Although he argues that governments have a responsibility to provide the basic needs of water to their people, he added that private corporations should also be held responsible. For example, he said, "Pepsi Cola companies and the like should be made to pay for the provision of water."
Pricing versus valuation is a debate that involves fears relating to the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) negotiations currently underway at the World Trade Organisation (WTO). So far, the European Union has asked 72 WTO member states to open up water delivery and waste management to international competition. According to the Observatory, "Bringing water supply under WTO disciplines may effectively make privatisation irreversible and close off the development of participatory and cooperative models."
Al-Weshah explained, "Many countries might make the mistake of agreeing unconditionally to the logic of pricing. However, in the Arab world, where 70 per cent of the water sources are outside of our boundaries, this is a dangerous position to take. Ethiopia does not need much of the Nile's water because of its high rains. But that does not mean that it would not want to sell it in the future. The same goes for the situation between Turkey and Iraq."
Cooperation and mutual understanding is of course rudimentary to water management. But so is the availability of funds. According to Michel Camdessus, chairman of the World Panel on Financing Global Water Infrastructure and former managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), "Financial flows will need to at least double for us to reach this goal [fresh water for all] by 2025. They will have to come from financial markets, from water authorities themselves through tariffs, from multilateral financial institutions, from governments and from public development aid, preferable in the form of grants." But with the global disparity between poor and rich increasing, and considering the big business water is becoming, the fear of the high costs of water for developing countries is yet to be alleviated.
According to the United Nations World Water Development Report: "[T]he real tragedy is the effect it [water crisis] has on the everyday lives of poor people, who are blighted by the burden of water-related diseases, living in degraded and often dangerous environments, struggling to get an education for their children and to earn a living and to get enough to eat." The report goes on to indicate that "solving the water crisis in its many aspects is but one of the several challenges facing humankind as we confront life in this third millennium and it has to be seen in that context."
CEO took this logic to its logical conclusion: "The debt crises is arguably the single biggest obstacle to providing clean water to the world's poorest, but the global trading system is another major cause of the impoverishment of Southern countries and communities. As long as Northern governments refuse to discuss bold moves towards a fairer global economic system, their self-proclaimed commitment to improving access to clean water for the world's poorest remains hollow and hypocritical."
