Blue Gold: The Fight to Stop the Corporate Theft of the World's Water [B1618]

2002 PB with cover wear. In this "chilling, in-depth examination of a rapidly emerging global crisis" (In These Times), Maude Barlow and Tony Clarke, two of the most active opponents to the privatization of water show how, contrary to received wisdom, water mainly flows uphill to the wealthy. Our most basic resource may one day be limited: our consumption of water doubles every twenty years―twice the rate of population increase. At the same time, increasingly transnational corporations are plotting to control the world's dwindling water supply. In England and France, where water has already been privatized, rates have soared, and water shortages have been severe. The major bottled-water producers―Perrier, Evian, Naya, and now Coca-Cola and PepsiCo―are part of one of the fastest-growing and least-regulated industries, buying up freshwater rights and drying up crucial supplies.

A truly shocking exposé that is a call to arms to people around the world, Blue Gold shows in frightening detail why, as the vice president of the World Bank has pronounced, "The wars of the next century will be about water."

From the (sadly few) recent-ish Amazon/GoodReads reviews: "Blue Gold is a passionate plea to defend water as a public good-both against the privatization that turns it into a commodity and against the industrial pollution that renders it unusable. An essential book - its warnings are more real today than ever."; "This is one of the books that completely and deeply changed me. I was passionate about water politics before but this took it to another level. I learned so much and would recommend it to anyone who wants to understand the privatization of natural resources: how it happened, what is has caused, and how might we change it."; "Everyone concerned about water should read this. Water is essential. This read is essential."; "Who owns our water? Shocking book about corporate invasion of our water systems. More and more countries, including parts of our own, have allowed corporate interests to take over water. Examines what happens, and to whom. Discusses the profit motive that companies have and how it affects the distribution of water. Everyone MUST read this book. You will never again assume that the water that comes out of your faucet will always be there."