Monday, February 7, 2011

privatization of water

http://www2.macleans.ca/2009/09/03/the-market-solution/

This topic is a hot point for debate. We saw arguments against in the case study “The Corporation”. Also Les spent a part of lecture “Externalities” discussing the topic. I read this article on the MacLean’s website about the topic.
Even though the idea of private companies running our water utility’s is a scaring thought for most, we should really not dismiss the idea without looking at our current modal. Right now 1.1 billion people do not have access to clean drinking water (this figure is dated), and with an ever increasing population (around 7 billion) on earth. The amount of people that do not have drinking water is a significant amount. So in reality we need new ideas in order in order to fix the current system. Also in Cochabamba, Bolivia the city that was protesting the privatization of its water, even now after they reverted back to public system it’s still not working. Figures in the above article show 80 percent of the new management are not “qualified to perform their responsibilities”. The system is full of corruption, and still most of the city goes without drinking water.
I am not saying that public systems don’t work, because in Canada we have overall a good system. Though in the developing world it is not working! A possible solution they outline in the article is maybe privatize but with heavy government regulations. By creating the private enterprise it could remove the issue of corruption. It could also create a better disruption of fresh water. Countries like Canada, Greenland, and others that have abundance could begin to trade their fresh water, to areas that have high population, but low supply.

Stephen Hatton
Wednesday 8:00am

No comments:

Post a Comment