http://www.arabnews.com/?page=4§ion=0&article=120631&d=23&m=3&y=2009
Monday 23 March 2009 (27 Rabi` al-Awwal 1430)
Earth is running dry and Istanbul water consensus aims to stop it
Richard Ingham I AFP
ISTANBUL: A seven-day meeting on the world's water crunch ended yesterday
with a pledge by more than 100 countries to strive for clean water and
sanitation for billions in need and fight drought and flood.
The declaration, coinciding with World Water Day, was issued at the end
of a three-day ministerial meeting, climaxing the biggest-ever conference on
the planet's freshwater crisis.
"The world is facing rapid and unprecedented global changes, including
population growth, migration, urbanization, climate change, desertification,
drought, degradation and land use, economic and diet changes," the statement
said.
It set out a roster of nonbinding recommendations, including greater
cooperation to ease disputes over water, measures to address floods and water
scarcity, better management of resources and curbing pollution of rivers, lakes
and aquifers.
Some countries tried to beef up the statement so that it recognized
access to safe drinking water and sanitation as "a basic human right," rather
than a "basic human need," which was the final text.
Around 20 dissenting countries signed on to a separate statement to spell
out their position after the conference's close. A Venezuelan delegate said
they included Bangladesh, South Africa and Spain.
The textual difference, which has political and legal ramifications, is
being debated under the UN Convention on Human Rights. Numerous countries, led
by Latin America, have already enshrined access to water as a right in their
constitution. The World Water Forum is held every three years, and has gained
in importance as a meeting place for debating the globe's amplifying problems
of freshwater.
At least 25,000 policymakers, water specialists and grassroots workers
took part in this year's event, a record attendance.
Campaigners representing the rural poor, the environment and organized
labor on Saturday attacked the forum as a vehicle for water privatization. "We
demand that the allocation of water be decided in an open, transparent and
democratic forum rather than in a trade show for the world's large
corporations," said Maude Barlow, senior adviser to the president of the UN
General Assembly.
The forum is staged by the World Water Council, a French-based
organization whose funding comes in large part from the water industry.
Providing access to drinking water and sewerage, conserving resources and
building reservoirs and dikes to cope with water stress and water excess would
cost rich countries alone around $200 billion per year, according to estimates.
"Mobilizing the resources ... is likely to be one of the greatest
challenges we face," said US delegate Alonzo Fulgham.
The ministers said they would "promote effective use of financial
resources from all sources" but did not state a preference for whether water
should be in public or private hands.
This is a thorny issue, because campaign groups say utilities that are in
private hands ramp up tariffs, hitting the poor especially.
However, the ministers said they "acknowledge" that the costs of
recovering water investment had to be "fair, equitable and sustainable." Around
880 million people do not have access to decent sources of drinking water,
while 2.5 billion people do not have access to proper sanitation, the
Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) said in its latest
report.
By 2030, the number of people living under severe water stress is
expected to rise to 3.9 billion, a tally that does not include the impacts of
global warming, according to the OECD report.
The world's current population of more than 6.5 billion is growing at the
rate of 80 million a year. By 2050, there is expected to be nine billion people.
Feeding them - and growing crops for biofuels - will spur even greater
demands from agriculture, which already takes up 70 percent of available
freshwater.
