-Caveat Lector-
<A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A>
DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER
==========
CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic
screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are
sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis-
directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with
major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought.
That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and
always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no
credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply.
Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
========================================================================
Archives Available at:
http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html
<A HREF="http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html";>Archives of
[EMAIL PROTECTED]</A>
http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
<A HREF="http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/";>ctrl</A>
========================================================================
To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Om
--- Begin Message ---
-Caveat Lector-
Thirsty for Justice
By Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman
Shown the folly of over-reliance on markets even in the world's richest
country, the market fundamentalists at the World Bank are continuing
their push for privatization of services -- with the provision of
drinking water at the top of the list -- in the developing world.
Water works plagued by poor service and underinvestment can be
rejuvenated by private water operators. That according to the World
Bank, a compromised consulting industry and the private water industry
-- dominated by the French firms Suez and Vivendi -- itself.
But citizen movements across the planet are rising to challenge the
World Bank and corporate schemes to wrest control of now-public water
systems. Perhaps the hottest flashpoint in the conflict between the
people and the Water Barons is in Ghana. There, the National Coalition
Against the Privatization of Water (NCAP of Water) is aggressively
opposing a Bank-advocated privatization scheme that would lease out the
country's urban water systems for a song. The scheme was hatched in
1995, and may be implemented next year, unless NCAP can thwart it.
(A newly released International Fact-Finding Mission assessment of the
Ghanaian privatization proposal is available at:
http://www.citizen.org/documents/factfindingmissionGhana.pdf)
To make the system generate enough revenue to pay the operator -- a
handful of international operators, including Suez and Vivendi, are in
the running to take over the system -- the privatization scheme would
require persistent rate hikes. The goal is to achieve "cost recovery" --
tariff revenue sufficient to meet operations and maintenance costs,
without any public subsidy to keep prices in check. This, even though
systems in the United States, among other industrialized countries,
routinely rely on support from general tax revenues.
Compounding the rate hikes, the privatization scheme calls for the
inclusion of an "automatic tariff adjustment" -- with rates rising
automatically to offset inflation and, most importantly, currency
devaluations. That makes sense from the viewpoint of the foreign
operator -- they will want to maintain constant profits in
dollar-denominated terms, not in cedis, the local currency. But it is a
disaster from the point of view of Ghanaian consumers -- their cedi
income does not go up just because the value of the cedi declines.
Assuming future devaluations, Ghanaian consumers will find themselves
paying a higher and higher proportion of their income to the water company.
In exchange for certain, ongoing rate hikes into the indefinite future,
Ghana is supposed to benefit from a more reliable and efficient system,
and from expansion of the piped water system to reach the millions of
urban consumers who are not connected to water pipes. But almost all of
the evidence suggests these promises will turn out to be illusions or deceptions.
First, the record of private water company operation in developing
countries is very poor. There is little to suggest that private
companies deliver "efficiencies" in this area, though they are clearly
skilled at extracting enormous profits.
The details of the Ghanaian privatization plans offer little comfort
that things will be different in this case.
There are some incentives built in the proposal to increase the amount
of water delivered -- many lower income Ghanaians may get water from
pipes only once every two or four weeks -- but the proposed leasing
terms would encourage the private operator to improve service for
high-volume richer consumers, rather than low-volume poorer ones.
Achievement of water delivery and other performance standards would be
self-monitored by the private water operator, overseen by a newly
created regulatory agency with little experience and little chance of
effectively controlling a giant multinational.
The proposed leasing arrangements impose only the most minimal
investment requirements on the private operator (who would lease the
system, rather than purchase it outright) -- and the operator is
guaranteed a return even on that minimal investment, making it more of a
loan than actual investment. So the operator will offer almost nothing
in terms of new money for repairs or pipe expansion.
There is some new money promised in the deal for pipe expansion. But the
money will all be in the form of new loans and some grants from the
World Bank and donor countries. The private operator does nothing to
obtain these loans, and has no pay-back obligations. This money --
desperately needed for system expansion -- could be made available right
now (or could have been provided five years earlier), but the Bank and
donors have made the loans and grants conditional on privatization.
Even this money is far less than needed to connect most urban Ghanaians
to the piped water system. They will continue to rely on exploitative
private water tanker operators, who buy water in bulk from the water
utility, drive to areas without piped water service and sell to
consumers at rates five or ten times that of price of piped water. The
poorest people in cities have no choice but to rely on these water
sources, and find themselves spending 10, 15 or even 20 percent of their
income on drinking water.
The tanker prices could easily be controlled. The utility could operate
tankers and sell tanker-provided water at the piped water rate. Or the
private tankers could be tolerated, but required to sell water at a
regulated price -- with the utility refusing to sell water to those
tanker operators who fail to comply.
The World Bank has not considered these approaches, and at least one
pro-privatization consultant's document suggests that such measures
would interfere with the flourishing private market in water provision!
NCAP of Water, like colleagues around Africa and elsewhere in the
developing world, rejects this market fundamentalist illogic. They
insist that drinking water be treated as a right, not a commodity.
Rather than inviting predatory multinationals in to drive up prices,
suck up profits, serve the urban elite, and ignore the poor, they say,
the public sector can and must be reinvigorated to ensure decent
delivery of water, one of life's essentials.
Russell Mokhiber is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Corporate Crime
Reporter. Robert Weissman is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based
Multinational Monitor, http://www.multinationalmonitor.org, and was a
member of the International Fact-Finding Mission on Water Sector Reform
in Ghana. They are co-authors of Corporate Predators: The Hunt for
MegaProfits and the Attack on Democracy (Monroe, Maine: Common Courage
Press, 1999; http://www.corporatepredators.org).
(c) Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman
This article is posted at:
http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/corp-focus/2002/000125.html
_______________________________________________
Focus on the Corporation is a weekly column written by Russell Mokhiber
and Robert Weissman. Please feel free to forward the column to friends or
repost the column on other lists. If you would like to post the column on
a web site or publish it in print format, we ask that you first contact us
([EMAIL PROTECTED] or [EMAIL PROTECTED]).
Focus on the Corporation is distributed to individuals on the listserve
[EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe, unsubscribe or change your address to
corp-focus, go to: <http://lists.essential.org/mailman/listinfo/corp-focus> or send an
e-mail
message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with your request.
Focus on the Corporation columns are posted at
<http://www.corporatepredators.org>.
Postings on corp-focus are limited to the columns. If you would like to
comment on the columns, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] or
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
<A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A>
DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER
==========
CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic
screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are
sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis-
directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with
major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought.
That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and
always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no
credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply.
Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
========================================================================
Archives Available at:
http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html
<A HREF="http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html";>Archives of
[EMAIL PROTECTED]</A>
http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
<A HREF="http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/";>ctrl</A>
========================================================================
To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Om
--- End Message ---
