The Luck of the Kagay-anons

In her recent book, Blue Covenant, author Maude Barlow, head of the Council of Canadians, painted three scenarios for disaster: the world's disappearing supply of freshwater, which she described as "the ground-level equivalent of greenhouse-gas emissions and likely as great a cause of climate change;" the increasing lack of access to clean water by a burgeoning population (more children are killed by dirty water than by war, malaria, HIV/AIDS, and traffic accidents combined), mostly affecting millions of poor people who only have access to contaminated water from rivers and wells; and third, the commoditization by water cartels which worsens the first two scenarios.

At worst, Barlow looks 20 years down the road where no progress has been made to provide basic water services to the Third World (that includes us!), or laws created to protect water sources and prevent corporatized industry/agriculture from polluting water systems, or curb the transfer of vast amounts of water elsewhere by pipelines or tankers, creating vast new deserts.

In this world, nuclear powered desalination ring the world's oceans, sewage water will be treated and sold back for a fortune to private utilities, arriving as very expensive drinking water in our taps, bottled water would be available only to the super rich and the poor will die like flies from lack of potable water.

Barlow cites how in the first seven years of the new millennium, more studies, reports, and books on the global water crisis have been published than in all of the preceding century. And all irrefutably lead to one conclusion: The world is facing a water crisis due to pollution, climate change, and surging population growth of unprecedented magnitude.

She paints a grim picture: "Unless we change our ways, by the year 2025 two-thirds of the world's population will face water scarcity. The global population tripled in the 20th century, but water consumption went up sevenfold. By 2050, after we add another three billion to the population, humans will need an 80 percent increase in water supplies just to feed ourselves. No one knows where this water is going to come from." Now, those are numbers Archbishop Jesus Dosado of Ozamiz can really contemplate.

Tragically, all these are coming down hardest on the two fifths of the world's people living in densely populated areas lacking sufficient sanitation, leading to massive outbreaks of water borne diseases.

Even now, half of the world's hospital beds are occupied by people with easily preventable waterborne diseases, and the World Health Organization reports that environmental factors, including contaminated water, are implicated in 80 percent of all sickness and disease worldwide.

In the last decade, the number of children killed by diarrhea exceeded the number of people killed in all armed conflicts since World War II. Every eight seconds, a child dies from drinking dirty water. Those are stiff odds for survivors of the artificial contraception gauntlet, Your Eminence, Archbishop Oscar Cruz of Lingayen-Dagupan.

So how did we get into such a big mess? Back in grade school, we learned there's a limited amount of fresh water on earth which goes through a hydrologic cycle that ensures its safe return to us for our perpetual use, or so we thought.

All was well and good for many millennia until human "progress" began tainting increasingly vast amounts of water in the equation through water pollution of an unprecedented magnitude. While the same amount of water could still be coursing through the hydrological cycle, increasing amounts of it are polluted.

One look at Bitan-ag Creek running through Limketkai Center and a grade schooler can instantly deduce there goes some water he's not going to be drinking anytime soon. Barlow says 90% of the Third World's waster water is dumped into local rivers, streams and coastal waters. Humans now use over half of accessible runoff water, leaving little for the ecosystem or other animal and plant life.

I perfectly agree with Barlow that the "freshwater crisis" is in every way a global threat the equal of climate change (to which it is deeply linked) in magnitude but doesn't quite pull in the increasing media buzz its Big Brother.

Barlow likens it to "a comet poised to hit the Earth." If a comet really did threaten Earth, our politicians in all likelihood would very quickly forget religious and ethnic differences, close ranks and find a solution to this common threat. Hmmm, come to think of it, quite a similar scenario to the ticking population bomb, Your Eminence, Archbishop Angel Lagdameo of the Catholics Bishops Conference of the Philippines, no?

It is ironic how the average Juan doesn't have an inkling that the world is facing a global water crisis. It doesn't merit the headlines and special reports of mainstream media, and when it does, it's usually tagged as a regional or local problem, but not a global threat.

But time is fast running out, the supply of potable water even quicker. I share Barlow's conviction that "now is the time for a collective solution to this emergency, a water conservation plan and water justice to address the crises of scarcity and inequity. The world has the knowledge to build a water-secure future but lacks the political will."

And I not only share, but also believe that all of us should share in her committment: "If this earth is to survive, it would require nothing less than reclaiming water as a commons for the Earth and all people that must be wisely and sustainably shared and managed. For this to happen, the basic tenets of market-based globalization: competition, unlimited growth, and private ownership must be replaced by cooperation, sustainability, and public stewardship."

Until then, our business leaders and government economic managers in the Oro Chamber, Promote CDO Foundation, City Government and national government agencies can quit harping about the Asian Institute of Management's "inherently flawed" study on city competitiveness.

They can give us all the low grades they want but ours is the only metropolis in the country today with a sustainable potable water supply thanks to the foresight of Engr. Ernie San Juan and his merry men from our much maligned water district for coming up with the bulk water supply project.

They could rank us No. 11 in city competitiveness but ours is the only city where it's safe to drink the tap water. It should take some time for our competitors to construct and operationalize a similar facility, and if the ten years it took the project to take off from initial bidding to operation is any indication, we'll still be enjoying that advantage for some time to come. Ain't we just plain dumb lucky we chose to live in this city?

30 -