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[bob ford <bobford79 AT yahoo.com>]

This subject has been discussed a few times on the list.  It is something 
about which I am almost paranoid, like privacy issues.  This woman being 
interviewed has her own political leanings and agaendae, which are, to me, 
beside the point.

For rural or urban homesteading, in general clean water is important not just 
for survival but for the indepependence and self-sufficiency that most of us 
seek.

  Concepts like 'man-made global warming' are hard for me to grasp, because I 
can't see anything but theory and conjecture.  It could be absolutely right 
or partially right, my head spins trying to separate the science from the 
propoganda.  Clean Water, or lack of it, I can see; 'now', as a huge issue 
that hardly anyone discusses .

The woman in this interview about water uses an idea she calls "virtual 
water", water that you import or export in things that take water to make, 
grow, or process.  That is something about which to think.  

 
History sometimes is made about things which are not expected.  What this 
administration does with its world leadership about water may become its real 
place in history, for the good or the bad. ....bobford


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>From today's wsj:


LIFE & STYLE NOVEMBER 8, 2008 Resources
How to Quench the World's Thirst 
The U.N.'s new water adviser talks about privatization, policy and the issue 
of 'virtual water

'By ALEXANDRA ALTER
   
Water has become a booming $500 billion industry, by some estimates. 
Economists and investors call it "the new oil" and "blue gold."

Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens, who has bought water rights for a chunk of the 
Ogallala aquifer in Texas and owns more water than any individual in the 
United States, has said the natural resource should be treated like any other 
commodity -- bought and sold for a profit.

In the U.S., companies such as Nestlé, which owns Poland Spring, extract 
hundreds of millions of gallons of groundwater a year. The companies often 
pay little to nothing for the water that they bottle and sell.

View Full Image

AFP/Getty Images
A young worker goes looking for water on a cassava plantation in Los Chiles, 
Costa Rica, which has been hit by a severe drought.
But where some see profits, others see peril. The world is running out of 
fresh H20, which accounts for just 3% of the earth's water. Recent moves by 
multinational corporations to privatize water sources could spell disaster 
for poor countries and residents with no means to pay.

In Bolivia, price spikes following water privatization led to riots in 2000; 
eventually, Bolivia expelled Bechtel, the engineering company that the 
government had contracted to take over management of the municipal water 
supply in the city of Cochabamba. Similar clashes over privatization and 
price hikes have broken out in Argentina, Uruguay, South Africa and Mali.

Geopolitical experts warn that water scarcity poses not just a public health 
risk, but a threat to global security. Currently, some 1.1 billion people, 
one-sixth of the world population, lack safe drinking water. Global water 
consumption is growing at unsustainable rates, doubling every 20 years, 
according to a March 2008 report by Goldman Sachs. A study by International 
Alert, a London-based conflict-resolution group, listed 46 countries with a 
combined population of 2.7 billion that have a "high risk" for violent 
conflict over water in the next two decades.

Maude Barlow, a Canadian water activist who has opposed privatization for 
more than 20 years, was recently appointed as the United Nation's first 
senior adviser on water issues. Her position, which is unpaid, was created by 
the Rev. Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann, president of the United Nations General 
Assembly. Here are highlights from her conversation with the Wall Street 
Journal.

WSJ: You've been an outspoken critic of the U.N.'s and the World Bank's water 
policies, saying that both have aided the "corporate takeover of the world's 
water." Were you surprised to be offered an advisory role at the U.N.?

View Full Image

The Council of Canadians
Maude Barlow
Maude Barlow: I don't think I would have been offered a role there by anyone 
but someone like Father Miguel. He cares deeply about the poor. He's a 
liberation theology priest from Nicaragua.

I've been critical and will continue to be critical of the overly close 
relationship of the U.N. to big water corporations. At a time when the need 
was growing so much, they said, 'Well, the private companies will pay for 
it,' and they didn't. No one has the right to appropriate water for profit 
while other people are dying.

What will you try to change about the U.N.'s water policies?

I would like to see it shift from reliance on water companies and 
privatization, what I call the hard path, to the soft path -- watershed 
protection, rain harvesting and watershed restoration. You can't have the 
human right to water if there's no water. Studies show that as we remove 
water from aquifers, we dry up the land. The rain won't come if there's no 
vegetation.

Some economists argue that privatization will reduce water consumption and 
waste, the way oil prices have spurred efforts toward more efficient energy 
use. Wouldn't putting a price on water actually help to reduce waste?

To me, the issue isn't whether you price or not, it's the conditions. There 
are three important conditions to putting a price on water. The first is that 
no one should be denied access because they can't pay. The second is that 
water is maintained by the public sector, so it's like a tax, not a fee. The 
third is, you're paying for the service, you don't own the water. It's very 
important that we say water is not a commodity.

Do you see any role for the private sector?

In the building of infrastructure and pipes. There's an important place for 
the private sector in water cleanup technology. There's no place for the 
private sector in water delivery. It should be delivered by the public sector 
on a not-for-profit basis.

The U.N.'s Millennium Development Goals to reduce global poverty include the 
objective of cutting the number of people without access to clean water in 
half by 2015. You have said that at the rate they're going, it will take much 
longer. What steps will you recommend to speed things up?

The twin pillars of a water secure future for the world are on the one hand, 
conservation and protection, and on the other hand, the human right to water.

One of my criticisms of the U.N. Millennium Development Goals about water has 
been the disconnect between those who are working on the environmental side 
and those who are working on the human-rights side. I don't think there's 
been nearly enough attention paid to protecting source water. Seventy-five to 
80% of surface water in India, China or Russia is too polluted to bathe in, 
drink or fish in.

The U.N. bought into the World Bank's solution, which is, bring in water 
companies and let them provide these huge projects, and if you're wealthy you 
can pay for water. They don't see it as their responsibility to provide water 
for the poor. I've been in communities with prepaid water meters. There's 
water, but they can't afford to turn the tap on, so they go to the river, 
where there are cholera warning signs.

In your latest book, "Blue Covenant," you write about virtual water -- the 
water that is used to produce commodities like cars and computer chips -- as 
a big source of water consumption.

I think we're going to hear a lot more about that in the next few years. The 
U.S. is exporting a third of its water in the form of virtual water exports 
through commodities. Britain and Japan import most of their virtual water.

Europe grows its roses in Africa around Lake Naivasha in Kenya. The lake is 
so damaged now that these companies are looking for new lakes in Uganda. It's 
not just looking at our water footprint in our own country and community and 
household. It's where your water footprint is coming from.

Has the financial crisis slowed the pace of global investments in water 
indexes?

What worries me is the opposite. It's the one area where people are still 
going to invest. It's not going to fluctuate the way other commodities do, 
because we're a species running out of clean water.

The other thing I'm worried about from the credit crisis is that 
cash-strapped municipalities and states may sell off water treatment plants 
to the private sector.

You've criticized the Bush administration for "gutting the Clean Water Act." 
and have noted that funding for water research in the U.S. has been stagnant 
for 30 years. Do you expect to see changes under an Obama administration?

I'm sure hoping. I think this is a much more environmentally conscious 
president coming in, as the issues around food, water and energy are becoming 
more prominent. I do think that we may have an opportunity with a more open 
administration and a more aware public to really start to move these issues 
forward. But if it doesn't happen, the U.S. is going to be one big Atlanta .

Which countries would you hold up as models in terms of sustainable water 
management?

None. Europe is way ahead in terms of how it cares for its water. However, 
Europe imports the bulk of its water footprint, so the way it protects its 
own water is to use and abuse other countries' water.

Write to Alexandra Alter at alexandra.alter AT wsj.com