| Online: | |
| Visits: | |
| Stories: |
| Story Views | |
| Now: | |
| Last Hour: | |
| Last 24 Hours: | |
| Total: | |
Nestlé’s Despicable Water-Crisis Profiteering
Author: David Dayen
California Gov. Jerry Brown has taken a lot of heat for announcing mandatory water reductions to cope with the state’s historic drought — even while exempting agriculture, which uses 80 percent of the available water supply, while accounting for just 2 percent of the state’s economy.
On ABC’s “This Week,” Brown countered that many farmers lost state and federal water allocations, forcing them to sacrifice hundreds of thousands of acres of farmland. He even added, “some people have more of a right to water than others.
In a technical sense, that’s true. Some farmers have “senior water rights,” dating back to the Water Commission Act of 1914, which puts them at the front of the line for allocations. But unlike the individual apartment dweller, farmers aren’t limited to “surface water” found in reservoirs and canals and streams.
They can also extract groundwater virtually unimpeded; until last year there were basically no regulations against anyone sticking a drill in the ground and pumping the water under the Earth — which has drained long-term water resources almost dry and contributed to the land actually sinking in some parts of the Central Valley.
Philosophers stone – selected views from the boat
http://philosophers-stone.co.uk
Source: http://philosophers-stone.co.uk/wordpress/2015/04/nestles-despicable-water-crisis-profiteering/
