Is Water Worth Fighting For?

Is water worth fighting for? In history past, wars were often fought for access to water, usually in the form of ports for shipping. However, the water wars of the future will have a very different form. They won't be wars of armaments; they will be paper wars, fought in the courts and the halls of legislatures. Strategic battle plans are already being drawn up in the board rooms of multi-national banks and investment corporations. Proclamations and resolutions regarding water issue forth from the United Nations with ever increasing frequency.

One need only observe the machinations of the United Nations in assessing the importance of water on a global scale. One in six people in the world doesn't have enough clean water for drinking, bathing and growing crops. The inequality of water distribution was a major point of discussion at the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development and there are several groups working on water issues within the UN. March 20^th has been designated World Water Day 2008.

North America has been blessed with an abundance of fresh water. Unfortunately, much of the world is not.

In many underdeveloped countries water is simply inaccessible due to lack of infrastructure. Modern well and pumping systems could go far toward providing access to potable water for much of the world's poorest citizens. Sanitary systems and fresh water coupled with hygiene education could go a long way toward alleviating much suffering, disease and child mortality.Other areas suffer from increasing desertification due to overgrazing and simple overpopulation of lands with naturally few water resources. Deforestation for firewood and housing further spreads the extent of desert in such areas.

In both the instances above, minimal investment in infrastructure and alternative forms of agriculture could greatly relieve the conditions caused by lack of obvious resources. Unfortunately, political concerns often compete directly with efforts to improve the lot of the populace. Increased assistance from the United Nations in the form of infrastructure-building and hygiene and agriculture education could go far to alleviate suffering. Instead, efforts seem to be focused more on obtaining cash and food aid which, if it gets to the populace at all, does nothing to ameliorate future problems.

Both the International Monetary Fund and the United Nations were founded at the end of World War II to assist poorer countries in developing their potential to compete on an equal footing with the rest of the world. Why they have not succeeded is no mystery. The UN seldom takes action directly, even when monies are provided for them to do so. Instead, the UN fancies itself a world 'director', directing someone else, usually the United States to do their work for them. The UN demands, and spends a great deal of money on absolutely nothing of value to the developing world except to support their UN ambassador in extremely wealthy style.

The IMF, on the other hand, makes 'loans'. These loans come with conditions which increasingly revolve in part around privatizing the water supply in those countries that actually have water available. This may explain in part why the nations poorest in natural resources fail to get necessary monies to improve their standard of living. If the IMF were truly concerned with improving the conditions in poorer countries, it would concern itself with greater forethought in the area of improving conditions for the people instead of simply loaning the money so a poor nation could pay off its national debts to wealthy investors. The IMF, as a banking-related organization, works as do all banking organizations and tries to maximize profit for its investors. The loans themselves appear to be a method to funnel funds from all of us to a third-world country in order to pay off their first-world banking buddies. In the process, they are certainly not averse to helping multi-national firms such as Betchel contract with those countries who have been ordered to privatize their water supplies. The letting of such contracts to meet IMF and World Bank demands have resulted in water shortages and hardship in several areas in South America, among them Bolivia and Equador.

Large multi-national corporations such as Betchel, Suez, Vivendi, RWE and others increasingly look to the privatizing of water as an income producing commercial project. The European Union sees water pricing structures as necessary to the free flow of trade and is implementing forced pricing structures that will force paid access to water on many areas for the first time in history. A quick look at NAFTA and its attendant partnerships and working groups show that this is already 'on the table' within the United States and Canada. This will come as a shock to most North Americans as they are hearing nothing about this and the subject has never been broached by their respective legislators. The push by the Bush administration to increase 'public-private partnerships' and encourage privatization of infrastructure to provide a quick fix to funding shortages opens the door wide for increased privatization of water supplies within the United States.

Already there are serious rumblings within areas of the US and Canada regarding the privatization, purchase and sale of water. Over-development without adequate planning for water reservoirs has caused serious shortages in the Atlanta Georgia area, to the extent that Georgia is seriously contemplating trying to annex part of Tennessee to gain access to their more plentiful water resources. Increased irrigation of produce fields and golf courses in Arizona has seriously depleted aquifers in the area and threatens drinking water supplies. California's irrigated food crops survive only because of irrigation from mountain streams piped and channeled into the complex irrigation system. All of these areas are eying the plentiful resources of the Great Lakes and trying to find a way to access its water. All of the states bordering the Great Lakes and Canada have developed and signed several pieces of legislation to protect their water from predation. In fact, both Michigan and Wisconsin are attempting to craft legislation to limit the amount of water major bottling corporations take out of the ground and ship out of those states. Expanded privatization threatens the ability of these states to protect their natural resources.

In all of the above cases of water shortages, the problem is either lack of infrastructure or inappropriate land usage for the climate and rainfall. Sub-Saharan Africa continues to degrade its land through over-grazing and increasing population past the point where the land can support it. Over-population is a major part of the problem in areas that simply lack infrastructure to provide water. Increased access to water will alleviate many of the people's problems but education to become better stewards of the land is critical for sustained well-being.

Atlanta has known for many years that their water resources would quickly become inadequate if development were to continue that it's recent fast pace. A two-year drought quickly compounded the problem to mammoth proportions. The only solution for their problems is to develop larger reservoir systems and discourage further rapid growth: getting water from someone else would simply be a stopgap measure.

Arizona, however, is primarily dessert. The little rainfall it gets barely supports the many varieties of cactus and wildlife. All crops must be irrigated. The draw of Arizona farming is the long sunny growing season and access to cheap illegal labor. Constant irrigation is depleting the aquifer at an alarming rate. The growing recreation industry is providing an increasing number of golf courses and swimming pools for their winter population of 'snowbirds'-winter residents. Agri-biz in Arizona has only come into existence in the past thirty years and it's hard to support statements that it is needed to feed the country. Previously, those same crops were raised in diffuse areas that needed little irrigation and provided jobs for local residents.

California has utilized so much water out of the Colorado River that it goes dry 90 miles short of it's original outlet in the Gulf of California.. So much water is used for irrigation in California that there is serious academic speculation that irrigation is changing the climate. Large bodies of water are well-known for creating their own micro-climate. Movement of water from areas in which it is naturally abundant to areas naturally dry can affect both areas, changing the ecology of the region. True non-politicized sustainability, then requires that man work within his climate instead of trying to change it.

Corporate interests however, are seldom thoughtful and forward-thinking enough to look into the future to see the damage their increased next-quarter profits will do. There will be increasing efforts in the very near future to gain control not only over municipal water systems but private wells and open water sources. Already the International Clean Water plans and agreements have attempted to limit open access to lakes, ponds and rivers by riparian residents. Control of watersheds is likely far less about protecting the water supply and more about controlling the valuable asset it has become.

The ecology movement is somewhat naïve to believe they are actually doing good works in protecting the water by removing it from private ownership as one who owns a resource guards it more jealously than any governmental institution. It would be disingenuous to believe this water will be managed freely for the good of all. The structures to control water access are in place and the process by which it will be taken from its rightful owners-the people-is being codified into regulations and international agreements. Municipal water systems are already being leased to outside entities and there is serious discussion regarding the feasibility of forcing metering on private household wells. Planning and zoning changes nationwide have already mandated that the State must be informed of all wells, in use or abandoned and regulates both new wells and the capping of unused wells. Obviously, all sources of water are coming under the control if not outright ownership of the state or federal government.

So, the war for water, if there is one, is being waged right now without firing a shot. Considering the theft of our natural resources for private gain is happening now, under our noses and without our knowledge, it is unlikely there will ever be a war in the sense we think of war. Given the size of the national debt of the US, it's only a matter of time before the IMF shows up to bale us out. What will be the cost? If water is truly worth fighting for, we need to start fighting right now. It may already be too late.