I monitored a World History class today - and I learned a lot.
Today's assignment was to watch a film titled "Even the Rain", which was released in 2012. It is worth watching, and you can buy it on Amazon if you click on the link below:
The story line is that a film company traveled to Brazil to shoot a movie that discussed Christopher Columbus's early days in the new world. Unfortunately for the film company, they landed in the country (Bolivia) at the very start of the Water Wars in Bolivia, which actually occurred in late 1999 and early 2000.
Here's a synopsis of that war:
The Cochabamba Water War was a series of protests that took place in Cochabamba, Bolivia's fourth largest city, between December 1999 and April 2000 in response to the privatization of the city's municipal water supply company SEMAPA. The wave of demonstrations and police violence was described as a public uprising against water prices.
The tensions erupted when a new firm, Aguas del Tunari – a
joint venture involving Bechtel –
was required to invest in construction of a long-envisioned dam (a priority of
Mayor Manfred
Reyes Villa), so they had drastically raised water rates. Protests,
largely organized through the Coordinadora (Coalition in Defense of Water and
Life), a community coalition, erupted in January, February, and April 2000,
culminating in tens of thousands marching downtown and battling police. One
civilian was killed. On 10 April 2000, the national government reached an
agreement with the Coordinadora to reverse the privatization. A complaint filed
by foreign investors was resolved by agreement in February 2001.
San Francisco - based Bechtel Construction was a partner in Aguas del Tunari.
Due to strong local resistance, Aguas del Tunan was forced to shut down their operations and leave the country.
Exploitation of local
resources by foreign companies is happening all over the world. In my native
state of Minnesota, the groundwater near the Boundary Waters canoe area us
being threatened by a foreign mining company.
https://www.friends-bwca.org/sulfide-mining/twin-metals-mining/
Antofagasta, the Chilean-conglomerate that owns Twin
Metals, has proposed a mine that would tunnel under Birch Lake and the
Kawishawi River. These bodies of water drain directly into the Boundary Waters.
The processing facility, where they would pulverize the
ore to extract trace amounts of copper and other metals, and the mountains of
reactive waste rock they would produce each day, would all be done at the edge
of the BWCA.
Recently, the U.S.
Forest Service released an environmental study that proposed a 20-year copper mining moratorium on federal
land near the Boundary Waters Canoe Area. It is the latest step in a bid by the
Biden administration to place a long-term pause on proposed copper-nickel mines
across a large swath of northeastern Minnesota.
The 20-year “mineral withdrawal,” as it’s formally known, was first proposed in the waning days of the Obama administration. But the proposed moratorium was canceled under the Trump administration, and the unfinished environmental study was never released, despite calls from Congressional and state leaders.
Then,
in October, the Biden administration again proposed to ban new copper
mining in the region for 20 years, arguing it was needed to protect the
Boundary Waters “from adverse environmental impacts” from mining.
Theft of water by a
foreign corporation is also happening in Arizona. This time, the guilty party
is based in Saudi Arabia.
Arizona
is in the midst of a water crisis. Drought and overuse have parched the
Colorado River and its attached reservoirs. As a result, Arizona must
endure new water cuts this upcoming year. And while state legislators
contemplate expensive solutions like desalination technology, the State Land Department has allowed a
private company to use up precious groundwater in Butler Valley. Not only is the company using
massive amounts of water, which is bad enough, they are paying the State a
fraction of the water’s value in what has been called a “Sweetheart” deal. The
company, based in Saudi Arabia, goes by the name Fondomonte. Their business in
Arizona—cultivate the water-intensive crop alfalfa. The alfalfa is then shipped back to the Middle East and
used to feed livestock. Meanwhile, the local water crisis pervades.
The lesson from the movie, as well as the latest progress on the Boundary Waters, is proof that even “the little guy” can win battles against giant corporations. To date, there has not been strong opposition to what the Saudi Arabian company has been doing to the aquifer in Arizona – but that could change if enough citizens, and a Democratic governor, take strong enough action to save a precious asset that none of us can afford to lose.
Fortunately, Democratic attorney general Kris Mayes is already calling for an investigation into the lease held by the Saudi company, which potentially could lead to a cancellation of the lease>
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