WUNRN
Women
are largely responsible for collecting and managing water resources in
developing countries, especially in rural areas, reports from the United Nations
Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM - UN Women) show. Without a ready source of
freshwater they may have to walk for several hours every day to find it, Ms.
Rauch-Kallat said. "It greatly affects women´s daily life, not just the
physical demands, but also when it comes to access to education, recreation and
child rearing. As the environment deteriorates women become increasingly
vulnerable. http://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/2007/womenday2007.html
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UN Special Rapporteur on the Right
to Water & Sanitation - Report on Private
Sector Participation & The Right to Safe Drinking Water & Sanitation:
Human Rights Treaties with Direct
Reference to Safe Drinking Water & Sanitation:
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Al Jazeera - Everywoman
Women & Politics of Water -
Video
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Water Rights Trade Agreements Human
Rights? Women & Girls
London (Reuters) Markets in water rights are likely to evolve as a rising population leads to shortages and climate change causes drought and famine.
But they will be based on regional and ethical trading practices and will
differ from the bulk of commodity
trade.
Detractors argue trading water is unethical or even
a breach of human rights, but already water rights are bought and sold in arid
areas of the globe from
"We at Blackhawk strongly believe that water is
in fact turning into the new gold for this decade and beyond," said Ziad
Abdelnour, president and chief executive of U.S.-based private equity firm
Blackhawk Partners.
"No wonder smart money is aggressively moving
in this direction."
For now, however, he cited buying shares in water
treatment companies or utilities, rather than water trade per se.
Some of the big investment banks dominant in commodities are among those who have voiced
skepticism water could ever attract direct trade.
A senior executive at one bank said exposure through
agricultural commodities, whose price is heavily dependent on water availability,
was his preference.
One reason water markets
may never be attractive to big banks and financial players is that they are
driven by water-stressed regions. Given the difficulty of transporting water
long distances or of establishing a single trade delivery point, as used on
other commodity markets, water dealing may never become global.
WORLD'S BIGGEST FOOD GROUP
That's good news for those worried that turning
water into a tradable commodity could attract speculation.
Buying shares in utilities or positions on the
grains market has not solved the lack of investment and huge amounts of wasted
water, which have played a role in crop failures and rises in grain prices.
Among the most prominent executives to advocate
water trade -- albeit according to clearly defined parameters distinct from
exchange-based global commodity dealing -- is Peter Brabeck, chairman of
Nestle.
He and others at the Swiss headquarters of the
world's biggest food group, whose profitability relies in large part on
managing commodity prices, cite research showing 30 percent of global cereal
crop production will be at risk by 2025-2030 unless current trends can be
halted.
But he does not expect water trade to provide a
solution in time for any 2025-2030 crisis.
SHORT-TERM SOLUTION
For the nearer future, Nestle has embraced the concept
of a cost curve that assesses demand and supply from the same river basin or
other water source to help farmers and other users share out supply in the most
efficient way.
Also based in
"Producing food with desalinated water or
increasing use of fertilizers because of water scarcity or pollution due to
lack of sanitation increases the price of the food," she said.
Her "ethical water titles" would, as futures
contracts, transfer ownership of waste water -- ensuring a commitment to process
it to a useable quality -- to big water users such as mines and farmers, who
would buy treated waste water or water treatment.
Just as Issumo emphasizes the ethical and
environmental benefits of recycling and ensuring proper treatment of waste water,
Fredrick Royan, a research director specializing in water at London-based
consultancy Frost & Sullivan, flagged up the "re-use resell"
model.
"There is a strong case (for treated wastewater
trading) because you get into ensuring a higher standard of treatment, reducing
pollution and creating a market mechanism where there is a financial incentive
for sellers or treatment facilities to install technologies," he said.
"Instead of (the market) being a straight line
going from supply to demand, it will have more of a circular element where
water is supplied, used, treated, reused again or put back into the supply
stream. It becomes a much more efficient process."
Royan did not anticipate water becoming "so
commoditized" it would have lots of speculators, but any trade would
require a high level of oversight to the avoid problems that have beset other
new markets, notably carbon.
Royan noted the world's biggest emerging market China
was well ahead as it focuses on the need to provide for its enormous
population.
As an early adopter of technology for treating waste
water, which paves the way for trading treated waste water to power plants, it
could be at the vanguard of the next generation of water trade, he said.