If we keep H2O pristine and public, it will teach us how to live.

                                                                             Maude Barlow

by Adria Vasil on NOW

Three years later she cautions that, despite the rise in water consciousness, the stage is being set for unprecedented global drought, mass starvation and millions of water refugees. In Blue Future, Barlow catalogues a vast array of H20 abuses due to fracking, tar sands extraction, biofuels, mining, austerity measures and privatization. But she still believes the story doesn’t have to end in tragedy.

Ecoholic talks to Barlow about the massive rethink needed to save the source of all life.

What do you think is the fundamental problem in our approach to water?

We need a new water ethic, making it a human right and a public trust; we need to [respect] that it has rights, and to understand it will teach us how to live with one another. If we allow water to be put on the open market like oil and gas, we’re going to see millions more people die.

How can we hold the Harper government to account?

This government doesn’t recognize the legal obligations it has, and has dismantled all the rules and tools protecting freshwater: gutting the Fisheries Act and the Navigable Waters Protection Act, which means 99 per cent of our lakes and rivers are now unprotected from fracked or tar sands oil carried by pipelines. We are hoping the next step will be that First Nations use the UN resolution in their fight for clean water.

Can you talk about trends in privatization?

Water is now being bought and sold as private property. It’s not just the privatization of water services but the privatization of the actual ownership of water. The worst is in Chile, where they’ve privatized water absolutely everywhere and auction if off. Canadian mining companies come to Chile and outbid local and indigenous communities and farmers for these rights.

Also, the World Bank in the Global South and austerity programs in Europe are promoting public-private partnerships (P3s). Here in Canada, the Harper government has said that if municipalities want funding for water services, they have to go P3. There was a referendum (September 25) on a P3 for a waste water treatment plant in Regina. We lost that vote. It’s going to blow up right across the country, one city after another. Hamilton tried privatization and has gone back to a public system, as have municipalities around the world. Privatization has failed so badly. Private companies have to deliver services but also at least 15 per cent profit for their investors. To do that they lay off workers, cut corners or raise the water rates. Forty municipalities in France alone, including Paris, have taken water back from private companies. Only in Canada are we setting out to do something that has been proven a mistake in so many other places.

Why should Canadians be worried about the Canada-Europe trade agreement?

 If we sign this, the two biggest water service [companies] in the world, Veolia and Suez, will be allowed to sue for millions of dollars in compensation if a municipality decides to go back to public water. The agreement is a noose around public water services.

Why don’t you support water metres on homes to encourage conservation?

I prefer taxation. This is a poor environment politically to ask for more taxes, so I think we need to shift the burden from families and small business, and charge licence fees to big commercial users. That does not mean any commercial user can access water if they pay. I oppose bottled water takings. In Ontario, users only pay $3.71 for a million litres; the public is subsidizing their profits. We have to fiercely manage water systems and care for them, and that can only be done under public and democratic control.

How can water teach us to live together?

We see conflict within and between countries over dwindling water supplies. I want people to think like the characters in those Hollywood movies when a comet’s coming. Suddenly, all the differences between people don’t mean anything, because it’s all going to be gone. There is a comet coming at us – it’s called the global water crisis, and we’re going to have to say, “I’ll give up an interest here for a larger good there; I’ll forgive an ancient hatred because we both have to survive on this watershed.” Water can be nature’s gift to teach us how to live with one another. It’s a peacemaking tool.

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UNITED NATIONS, Feb 11 (IPS) – Amidst growing new threats of potential conflicts over fast-dwindling water resources in the world’s arid regions, the United Nations will commemorate 2013 as the International Year of Water Cooperation (IYWC).

But Maude Barlow, chairperson, Council of Canadians and a former senior advisor on water to the president of the U.N. General Assembly in 2008-2009, warns the U.N.’s water agenda is in danger of being hijacked by big business and water conglomerates.

“We don’t need the United Nations to promote private sector participation under the guise of greater ‘cooperation’ when these same companies force their way into communities and make huge profits from the basic right to water and sanitation,” Barlow told IPS.

At this time of scarcity and financial crisis, she said, “We need the United Nations to ensure that governments are fulfilling their obligations to provide basic services rather than relinquishing to transnational corporations.”

The Paris-based U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), which has been designated the lead U.N. agency, formally launched IYWC at a ceremony in the French capital Monday.

In New York, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon warned of the new pressures on water, including growing populations and climate change. One-third of the world’s 7.1 billion people already live in countries with moderate to high water stress, he said.

“Competition is growing between farmers and herders; industry and agriculture; town and country,” Ban said. Upstream and downstream, and across borders, “We need to cooperate for the benefit of all now and in the future… Let us harness the best technologies and share the best practices to get more crop per drop.”

Back in December 2010, the 193-member General Assembly adopted a resolution declaring 2013 as the IYWC, following a proposal by Tajikistan.

The 2013 World Water Day, which will take place on Mar. 22, will be dedicated to water cooperation.

Barlow told IPS big water corporations have gained influence in almost every agency working at the United Nations.

The CEO Water Mandate, a public-private sector initiative launched by the United Nations in July 2007 and designed to assist companies in the development, implementation and disclosure of water sustainability policies and practices, puts corporations such as Nestle, Coca Cola, Suez and Veolia directly into a position of influence over global water policy and presents a clear conflict of interest, she said.

“For-profit private companies cannot uphold the public interest if it conflicts with their bottom line,” said Barlow, who is also founder of the Blue Planet Project.

Even the World Water Development Report is now advised by an industry group on “business, trade, finance and involvement of the private sector,” she added.

Tom Slaymaker, senior policy analyst on governance at the London-based WaterAid, told IPS the United Nations recognised the “human right to water and sanitation” back in 2010. “But today over 780 million lack improved water supplies and 2.5 billion lack basic sanitation facilities,” he added.

The 2013 International Year of Water Cooperation will be a critical year for the United Nations to reflect on why universal access has not yet been achieved, he said.

Slaymaker said it’s also time to reflect on the kind of political leadership and new forms of partnership that are required to accelerate progress towards universal access as part of the emerging post-2015 development framework of the United Nations.

According to the United Nations, the primary objective of IYWC is to raise awareness, both on the potential for increased cooperation, and on the challenges facing water management in light of the increase in demand for water access, allocation and services.

Since the General Assembly recognised the human right to water and sanitation, a number of countries, including Mexico, Kenya, Bolivia, The Dominican Republic, Rwanda, Ethiopia, Ecuador, El Salvador, The Netherlands, Belgium, the UK and France, have either adopted laws recognising the right to water or amended their constitutions to do so. The Vatican recently recognised the human right to water and added that “water is not a commercial product but rather a common good that belongs to everyone.”And last June, all 193 member states signed the Rio+20 Declaration which includes the recognition of the human right to water and sanitation as a universal right.

Specifically zeroing on the role of the private sector, Barlow told IPS that corporations are among those pledging their support for IYWC.

Aguas de Barcelona, the water company at the heart of a fierce debate in Spain over control of drinking water, is participating, she pointed out. So are “corporations who fought us on the right to water are now scrambling to claim it in their own image”.

She quoted Nestle as saying that 1.5 percent of the world’s water should be put aside for the poor and rest should be put on the open market. If Nestle gets its way, she argued, there will one day be a water cartel similar to big oil, making life and death decisions about who gets water and under what circumstances every day. “But at least we have this recognized and acknowledged right that no one should be allowed to appropriate water for personal gain while others die from an inability to pay for water,” she said. With time, “we will build consensus around the right to water and the understanding that water is a common heritage and a public trust.”