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Mon, 06 Feb 2006

Bottled Water: Nectar of the Frauds?

Abid Aslam, OneWorld US, Sat., Feb. 4, 2006

Here's the intro to a startling article on the world wide explosion in the consumption of bottled water. It shook up my own complacency about water.

I buy bottled water sometimes when I forget to bring some from home. It's water, and not a soft drink, so I'm smug about that - look how healthy I am! It's pure water, ideally spring water, not the chlorinated but still unclean crap from the tap.

So I'm cool as I drink my bottle of spring water that I bought cheap, or so I thought, at the grocery store. Turns out I'm just another pawn in the global water game

Judy K.

WASHINGTON, D.C., Feb 4 (OneWorld) - Water, water everywhere and we are duped into buying it bottled.

Consumers spend a collective $100 billion every year on bottled water in the belief--often mistaken, as it happens--that this is better for us than what flows from our taps, according to environmental think tank the Earth Policy Institute (EPI).

For a fraction of that sum, everyone on the planet could have safe drinking water and proper sanitation, the Washington, D.C.-based organization said this week.

Members of the United Nations have agreed to halve the proportion of people who lack reliable and lasting access to safe drinking water by the year 2015. To meet this goal, they would have to double the $15 billion spent every year on water supply and sanitation.

"While this amount may seem large, it pales in comparison to the estimated $100 billion spent each year on bottled water," said EPI researcher Emily Arnold. "There is no question that clean, affordable drinking water is essential to the health of our global community," Arnold said. "But bottled water is not the answer in the developed world, nor does it solve problems for the 1.1 billion people who lack a secure water supply. Improving and expanding existing water treatment and sanitation systems is more likely to provide safe and sustainable sources of water over the long term."

Read: Bottled Water: Nectar of the Frauds?