Water Warriors Reject Corporate Control on Water at Cupula dos Povos

RIO DE JANEIRO, Friday, June 16, 2012.“Water is life! Not for profit!” was the resounding message of the water warriors gathered at the plenary discussion on Water as Commons in Countering Green Economy, Privatization and Commodification during the opening of the Cupula dos Povos in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Around 100 participants attended the plenary discussion at the Blue Pavilion. The first session was devoted to analyzing the structural causes of the lack of access to water due to privatization.

Maria Teresa Lauron of IBON International traced the history of water privatization at the international level and shared Manila’s own experience with water privatization. According to Lauron, “the World Bank’s policy shift from the promotion of public water to privatization began n the 1970s to widen the access of investments for surplus capital from highly industrialized countries which were experiencing falling rates of profit at that time.”

This policy shift was implemented through conditionalities attached to loans from international financing institutions (IFIs). Since then, the commodification of water demanded that it be bought and sold in markets. Water no longer belonged to the commons. Access is available only to those can afford to pay.

“Manila now has the highest water rates in Southeast Asia after the privatization of the Manila Water and Sewage System. Waterless communities still exist. Workers were retrenched. New employees received lesser wages and hardly any benefits and were hired on a contractual basis,” said Lauron.

Speakers from Bolivia, Argentina and Senegal shared country experiences on water privatization.

Elizabeth Peredo of Fundacion Solon talked about how the glaciers in Bolivia are disappearing because of climate change is causing water supply shortage that causes severe hardships to the rural folk and threatens the urban areas and how water privatization worsens the impact of the glacier retreat.

In Senegal, foreign land deals resulted also in grabbing the already scarce water resources for small farmers according to Diery Gaye of the East & Southern Africa Farmers’ Forum (ESAFF) and People’s Coalition on Food Sovereignty (PCFS).

Anibal Faccendini of Catedra da Agua da Universidade Nacional de Rosario shared how water rates increased in Argentina after the privatization of water.

The second session of the plenary was devoted to the new solutions and paradigms to replace water privatization. Javier Marquez and Lourdes Martinez said that “Public-public and public-community partnerships are solutions to implement sustainable water management.” Unlike Public-private partnerships that allows private control of water resources, public-public and public-community partnerships up to some extent, bring back water into the realm of the commons by placing water resources under the control of communities which puts the needs of the people first, unlike private water concessionaires who se primary concern is increasing profits.

Ricardo Petrella exposed that the green economy is yet another move to expand corporate investment areas, including water resources. Petrella called for the stopping of the privatization commons, abolishment of the monetarization of water resources and declare illegal the monetarization of life itself

The Cupula dos Povos or the People’s Summit in Rio+20 is an event organized by the global civil society to celebrate people’s struggles for sustainable development and reject green economy being promoted in the official process of the UNCSD. #

To get regular updates on Rio+20, you may visit our official website at http://rio20.iboninternational.org/

Reference: Marjorie Pamintuan, IBON International, marjorie.pamintuan@gmail.com, (21)8069-0839

Congress in the Forest

If you want to know what we have done in the World Youth Congress, I guess this article would be a good way for you to learn about the programme. This is an international youth gatherings that explore the most effective role that young people can play in sustainable development.

So I participated in the congress, with the outcome that would produce a 20-point youth solution document which can be presented to the Government Delegations as they arrive for the UN Summit. (By the time I wrote this, the outcome has been published in the website: http://wycrio2012.org/20-solucoes-para-um-futuro-sustentavel/?lang=en)

There were several highlights in the congress. The opening ceremony was simple yet meaningful. We have five Hawai´ian singing tradditional chant Ãina, which means land, telling us how to respect and care for the ferns and flowers, conserve the earth and plants for future generations and never taken by the roots. The chant was followed by a sharing of indigenous people in Brazil which narrated the story of Indians in Brazil. Brazilian Indigenous people have contributed vast knowledge which is used today by pharmaceutical corporations, material and cultural development. 

A Hawaiian chanting

This man has travelled many places with this flag. 

A roundtable on ´What is the most effective role for youth in development?

A performance of Brazilian indigenous people before the congress debateÇ ´This House believes that people will only adopt more sustainable lifestyles when forced to do so by tax and legislation´. 

The congress was taken place at Sitio das Pedras, a beautiful compound surrounded by the Atlantic Rainforest that is located at the foot of an enormous rock named ´Macio da Pedra Branca´(white rock Massiif). It was firstly built to be a Benedictine Monetary during the 18th century and a century later the site was then transformed into a Tibetan Buddhist Temple and Monastery. 

At the congress site, we talked a lot on sustainability. The organising team also made their very best effort to minimize the environmental impact of the congress. We recieved a mug and a sqeeze bottle to fill up our drinks, we disposed of the food waste that was to be composted and the carbon emissions of all the flights were compensated by a reforestation project in Serra da Misericordia, a mountain right in the middle of the favela that we have visited for our action projects. Besides that, we were provided with delicious vegetarian food that showed that we can actually live on a diet that without meat and thus diminish our ecoogical footprint. Sleeping in the tent actually had saved lots of electricity, although it required a bit of time for us to accommodate with the little space of the tent. Imagine a camping site for 300 people!

Anyhow, it was a great experience to start off with the congress! Coming up next with other exciting contents in the camp! 

It´s almost 1.30am at Sao Paulo. Good night everyone! 

Overview of Rio+20 summit

The biggest international event this year is the UN Conference on Sustainable Development or Rio+20 on 20-22June. It was meant to celebrate the Earth Summit of 1992, to reaffirm the political commitments made then, and to come up with up-to-date action plans to counter the crises which have become much more serious than 20 years ago.


Right here in Rio de Janeiro, I am attending this summit and hope to absorb as much knowledge as possible. On the first day of 3rd Preparatory Meeting of UNCSD, I participated the opening ceremony and sat at the Malaysian Delegate chair (behind the seat) and hoping to meet the delegation. The Malaysian delegation consists of 8 people headed by Mr. Yogeesvaran, the deputy director (MAKRO) of Economic Planning Unit under PM's office, followed by Mr. Azhar Noraini the director of Environment and Natural Resources Economy Section, Mdm Arsulaiha, Mr. Chandran Sundaraj from Policy Planning and International Relations Division of Ministry of Energy, Green Technology and Water (KeTTHA), Mr Kamal (perhaps from MoAgriculture) and others. The delegation was not big. It's most probably that the minister of KeTTHA, YB Dato Sri Peter Chin Fah Kui 'will come to attend the conference on 19th onwards. Basically, Malaysian position on SDGs will always be following G77. 
On the other hands, I introduced myself to Mr. Martin Khor, the Executive Director of South Centre whom I am sure, is a very influential, experienced and knowledgable person in the UN and NGO.  Talking about the policies and the UN negotiation process, Mr. Chandran admited that the delegation from NGO are more expertise than the government to some extend, the ministry should be humble and have more interaction and coorperation with the NGOs, such as inviting them to participate in the negotiation process. 


So, I was welcomed by the Malaysian delegation, Pn Arsulaiha was the person I have spoken to and I thought we´re going to spend a great time at Rio+20! 


Alright, due to time constraint, I couldn´t write too much here, the travel from Copacabana to RioCentro took 2 hours if there´re peak hours in the city. I wish to update more. Please, allow me to share more of my experience in the coming days! 


To end today´s blog, I hereby share with you the outcome of the 3rd Preparatory Meetings (official) which was updated from the Rio+20 google groups:


[Brazil has taken the Presidency of the conference, but only 37% of the the text is agreed. (Target was min. 60%)
They will present a consolidated text tomorrow at 12 midday at the plenary which all should be able to attend. There will be no other official business until midday.
Brazil said that they will conduct the sessions in the same manner as prep-com and major groups -should- be able to engage.
Enjoy your lie in guys, you will need it to work hard for the rest of the conference.
Brazil aim to agree the entire text by the 19th July so we have hard work against us.]

Ola Brazil!

After 24 hours of restless flying journey with Emirates, we have finally set our foot on Rio de Janeiro!! It was not less than 2 hours of waiting at the airport for the shuttle service that sent us to Sitio des Pedras, the location of 6^th World Youth Congress.

The first impression of the congress was a process of waiting. Since the camping site was not ready, we put our luggage in a store room, filled our stomach, then queued up to get a tent for two. Today was a challenging day where an extraordinary wind (or small tornado?!) that actually destroyed one of the canopy at the camp site. So the people were evacuated, slept under the open air and enjoyed the cool night with the rain forest in Brazil.

Some people were upset for the inconveniences caused, but what can we people do was actually accommodate our emotions according to the situation because no matter how sad we were, things existed. Complaints won’t improve the situation, it would only bring more negative energy to the people around.

For me, it’s like another kind of summer camp to a greater extend. I enjoyed very much having to experience such an extraordinary congress in a brand new Latin America country I have ever visited.