Women and Water Privatization

By Ana Elena Obando

The increase of the global degradation of ecosystems, the excessive consumption of water, contamination and salinization of water-bearings, aquifers and dams, along with the impact of extreme poverty which has been worsened by privatization, are contributing factors to an environmental catastrophe.
This has had profound effects on the availability of drinking water and, consequently, has led to the violation of the right to life, safety, food, health and education of billions of human beings.
Water is a fundamental and inalienable human right and a common good that every person and institution of this planet should protect. This resource is, like air, a heritage of humanity and must be declared that way. Water is not merchandize and no person or institution should be allowed to get rich from the sale of it. It should not be privatized, marketed, exported or transferred to a few multinational companies, which today already control 90 percent of privatized water utilities. For the GATT, NAFTA and FTAA, water is a commodity, an investment, a simple service for commercial use and profit.

The Privatisation of Water

By Susan Bryce

There once was a time when water fell freely from the clouds in the sky and bubbled from the springs in the hills...when the rivers, streams and lakes were full to the brim...when ancient underground aquifers flowed like great veins beneath the continents...when water nurtured our people, like babes sustained by their mother's milk.
Today, water has become a scarce resource. Climate change has wreaked havoc with the weather, and the clouds no longer pour their tears of life upon our great forests. Vast agricultural lands suck rivers and streams dry. Our lakes are choked with dead fish which have been suffocated by industrial pollutants. The bowels of the Earth are constantly relieved of their waters, millions of years old.

Water privatisation — Reaching epidemic proportions

By Pratap Ravindran

There are concerns that a handful of private companies could soon control a large chunk of the world's most vital resource. While the companies portray the expansion of private water as the natural response to a growing water shortage crisis, thoughtful observers point out the self-serving pitfalls of this approach, says Pratap Ravindran. THE privatisation of water in India is barrelling ahead in spite of mounting evidence — especially from the Africa — that it leads to epidemics. Analysts cite the case of Dolphin Coast in South Africa where local councils had, in 1988, commercialised water and compelled local residents to pay the full cost of drinking water.

Investigating Some Alleged Violations of The Human Right to Water in India: Report of the International Fact Finding Mission to India

Ed by Sabine Pabst, Ashwini Mankame, and Preeti Purohit

Between 8th and 14th January 2004 FIAN International and Bread for the World conducted an international Fact Finding Mission to India. The international Fact Finding Mission investigated the problems concerning the implementation of the human right to water in selected areas in India. Bread for the World is the development organisation under the auspices of the Protestant Churches in Germany. Since 1959 it is seeking to contribute to overcome hunger and poverty in the so-called developing countries, being committed to the objectives of"Justice for the Poor".