CHAMINADE MODEL UNITED NATIONS 2016
TOPIC 2: PRIVATIZATION OF WATER
INTRODUCTION
Water is arguably the most important resource in the entire world. All living
things and animals require water for survival. Without water there would be no life on
earth. It is the key to survival and the well being of the human race. Unfortunately due
to many issues including global warming, widespread drought, increased pollution of
water world wide as well as the world’s growing population water security has become
one of the world’s most pressing issues of the 21st century.
Water Security is defined as the capacity of a population to safeguard
sustainable access to adequate quantities of acceptable quality water for sustaining
livelihoods, human well-being, and socio-economic development, for ensuring
protection against water-borne pollution and water-related disasters, and for preserving
ecosystems in a climate of peace and political stability. This definition provides the
framework for the UN’s stance and will facilitate the work of the UN and it’s subsidiary
organizations (UN Water, UNESCO, UNEP). According to UNESCO in order to achieve
water security, “we must protect vulnerable water systems, mitigate the impacts of
water-related hazards such as floods and droughts, safeguard access to water functions
and services and manage water resources in an integrated and equitable
manner. Water Privatization is when a private sector company gets involved with the
provision of water itself as well as sanitation. Usually when a country is interested to
the switch from government controlled water to private sector controlled they will hold a
competition of sorts among companies in which the companies present their plans to
the nation’s government. Eventually the government will decide on a winner and give
that company a full or partial contract in which they will either take complete control of
the nations water or partial control when only partial control is given then they become
PPP’s (Public Private Partnerships). This is often done in many other areas including
public transportation and national defense. Water Privatization is currently used in 32
Countries including France, England, United States of America, Brazil, China and
Germany. Each of these nations have Water Privatization to a certain extent some
have implemented it in the whole country some have it only in certain regions. However
they still impact the usage and consumption of water for millions of people.
CURRENT SITUATION
Although water security is not a new issue only in the past 15 it has become a
much more pressing topic, with the new focus on water conservation and protection. In
addition people around the world have seen the pros and cons associated when
CHAMINADE MODEL UNITED NATIONS 2016
privatized sectors get involved with issues usually faced by the individual nations
government. In July 2010 through resolution 64/292 the United Nations recognized
access to clean water as a universal human right. Explicitly recognizing the human right
to water and sanitation and stating that clean water is a necessity that must be met for
all other human rights to be realized. However at the same time organizations like The
World Bank have actually funded and pushed for the privatization of water. Despite the
known shortcomings of this practice, one of the biggest problems when crucial public
services become privatized include inflation in prices, these has proved true especially
in this case. For example, the price for one cubic meter of water in the New York City is
under 1 US Dollar. However the same amount of water in nearly 6 times the price in
Colombia. Many developing nations around the world, have seen a steep increase in
cost. This made water an unaffordable commodity for the citizens in these countries.
You may be wondering why nations would even consider letting a private
organization interested only in profit control something as important as that nations
water supply. In developing countries the hope is that privatizing water will lead to
increased efficiency as well as better service to the citizens. This has proved to true
and successful in some nations and not so much in others. Countries that have been
successful in water privatization include Algeria, Colombia, Ecuador, Morocco, Senegal
and Saudi Arabia. This success means that water has become more accessible in
these nations, as stated above the price has increased but nonetheless water is still
available and that’s a positive. These nations have been successful because they have
all set up effective partnerships between the private organization as well as the nation’s
government. These countries have also successfully developed infrastructure, which
have proved crucial to their success. Despite this success many nations have failed in
their effort to privatize their water some of the nations include Bolivia, Indonesia and
Tanzania. These failures prove that Water Privatization can succeed as long as it is put
in place by a responsible government, and undertaken but a legitimate company who
will follow rules set by the nations government, as well as work towards developing the
countries infrastructure. Water Privatization may in fact be a viable solution to our water
crisis when done correctly.
KEY PLAYERS IN THE WATER PRIVATIZATION BUSINESS
There are 10 major corporations that are involved with water privatization around
the world, however the three biggest companies provide their serives to almost 300
million people in over 100 countries. These companies are: Suez & Veolia from France
and RWE-AG of Germany. The growth of not only these companies, but that of all
companies involved with water privatization are growing at an exponential rate. 10
years ago the big three (Suez, Veolia and RWE-AG) served around 51 Million people in
CHAMINADE MODEL UNITED NATIONS 2016
12 countries, at the rate they are expanding it is believed that they will control over 70%
of Europe and North America’s water systems in a decade.
IMPACT OF PRIVATIZATION
Water Privatization usually impacts three main areas, access, tariffs and quality
ACCESS
According to the World Bank private water has provided water to 24 million
people in developing nations since the 1990’s this number was unexpected by
opponents of water privatization. However a study that compared the changes under
PPP’s to changes that occurred in publicly managed utilities over the same time frame
in Argentina, Bolivia and Brazil concluded that access to the water supply and sanitation
increased equally from the two methods. Companies are in the business of making
money. Whether you sell cars, or water profit is all that matters to large corporations.
Having said that when companies are only concerned with making a profit they simply
sell only to those who can pay meaning that only the wealthy can afford what the UN
called a universal human right. You can see the problem with this. Something that is
so crucial to human life shouldn’t become marketed they way you would a sports car or
pair of shoes in which you target a specific demographic. Water is for everyone. Not
only people who can pay.
TARIFFS
In a majority of cases water tariffs increased in the long run after privatizing. In
most cases around the initial point of privatization tariffs stayed equal to the rate prior
but gradually over time did begin to rise. However in areas where much of the
development was funded through aid, tariffs actually did not increase for a long period
of time, this was highly prevalent in Ivory Coast. In Senegal and Gabon tariffs declined
by 50% in the period of time between (2001-2006).
QUALITY
One reason why water privatization has been so heavily opposed is because
many people worry, that when water becomes controlled by a private corporation, the
nations government will lose the ability to set any standards that the company will have
to follow. Then this may lead to a total loss of control of the nation’s most valuable
resource, eventually leading to a decline in quality and cleanliness of the water.
However if the said nations agrees to a public private partnerships then the government
and the company will share control and therefore they will still have there guidelines and
quality control that the nation has in place. Another issue people have with privatization
CHAMINADE MODEL UNITED NATIONS 2016
is overall quality and cleanliness of the water. In a majority of cases, the quality of
water has drastically improved and proved beneficial. In addition these organizations
have actually developed infrastructure that the nation did not have prior to going private,
Thus improving the quality of life.
CONCLUSION
The issue of water privatization is a very unique issue. In some areas of the
world water privatization has flourished, been successful and save countless lives, on
the other hand many areas have failed and actually made their respective situation
worse then before they went private. At the end of the day it’s completely up to the
individual nation as to whether or not privatization is best for them. The United Nations
is limited in where they can make a difference because of each nation’s free will to
make their own choice. However delegates should seek to develop a set of guidelines
the United Nations Could present to countries that they could follow in order to make
their transitions to private water successful and avoid the failures many nations have
already experienced. Delegates should go over all the pros and cons of this practice to
see whether it should continue being practiced around the globe. Many of the issues
that concern people while valid haven’t been experienced yet. As the importance of
water grows the significance of this issue will as well, that is why it is crucial for
delegates to come up with a resolution to be proactive in this issue.
QUESTION TO CONSIDER
This committee is strongly advised to consider the following questions when
researching your country’s position on the topic:
1. Considering that water is a “Universal Human Right” does that make the
monopoly and private control of water a violation of the right?
2. Do the pros of water privatization outweigh the cons or vice versa?
3. What can the UN do to prevent water security from developing a source of
conflict in the future?
4. Can the UN do anything to address water security in stressed areas?
5. Should the focus be on climate change as means of water security?
CHAMINADE MODEL UNITED NATIONS 2016
Work Cited
https://thewaterproject.org/water_scarcity_and_privitization
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_privatization#Forms_of_privatization
https://www.citizen.org/documents/Top10-ReasonsToOpposeWaterPrivatization.pdf
http://www.theguardian.com/public-leaders-network/2015/mar/18/privatisationfailed-official-un-policy
http://www.alternet.org/story/151367/the_un_is_aiding_a_corporate_takeover_of_drinki
ng_water
http://www.globalresearch.ca/privatization-of-water-as-an-owned-commodity-ratherthan-a-universal-human-right/5378483
http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/jan/30/water-privatisationworldwide-failure-lagos-world-bank
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_privatization
http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/jan/30/water-privatisationworldwide-failure-lagos-world-bank
http://www.un.org/waterforlifedecade/human_right_to_water.shtml
http://www.unwater.org/topics/water-security/en
http://www.ppiaf.org/sites/ppiaf.org/files/FINAL-PPPsforUrbanWaterUtilities-PhMarin.pdf
http://www.brettonwoodsproject.org/2011/11/art-569208/
http://hdr.undp.org/sites/default/files/reports/267/hdr06-complete.pdf
http://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/water
CHAMINADE MODEL UNITED NATIONS 2016
https://www.globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/209/43398.html
http://en.unesco.org/themes/water-security
http://www.unwater.org/downloads/watersecurity_analyticalbrief.pdf