Canada: Losing Water Through NAFTA
TORONTO - Under the North American Free Trade Agreement, Canada lost control over its energy resources. Now, with “NAFTA-plus”, it could also lose control over its freshwater resources, say experts.
Canada’s water is on the trade negotiating table despite widespread public opposition and assurances by Canadian political leaders, said Adèle Hurley, director of the University of Toronto’s Programme on Water Issues at the Munk Centre for International Studies.
A new report released Sep. 11 by the programme reveals that water transfers from Canada to the United States are emerging as an issue under the auspices of the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP). The SPP — sometimes called “NAFTA-plus” — is a forum set up in 2005 in Cancún, by the three partners, Canada, United States and Mexico.
Economic integration as envisioned by the powerful but little-known SPP is slowly changing the lives of Canadians, says Andrew Nikiforuk, author of the report “On the Table: Water Energy and North American Integration”.
The SPP is comprised of business leaders and government officials who work behind the scenes and are already responsible for changes to border security, easing of pesticide rules, harmonisation of pipeline regulations and plans to prepare for a potential avian flu outbreak, Nikiforuk writes.
“The SPP is run by corporate leaders; governments are irrelevant,” said Ralph Pentland, a water expert and acting chairman of the Canadian Water Issues Council.
Pentland envisions a future where, in response to ongoing drought problems in the United States, the SPP will make arrangements to dole out millions of dollars of public funds for private companies to build pipelines to transfer water from Canada.
“The SPP is like putting the monkeys in charge of the peanuts,” he told Tierramérica.
Massive water diversions from Canada do not make economic or environmental sense, according to water experts. Far better and cheaper is to improve water efficiency and eliminate waste. The United States and Canada lead the world in water consumption and are extraordinarily wasteful, Pentland says.
Moreover, most of Canada’s water is in the far north, not near its border with the United States. And even the transboundary Great Lakes are at their lowest levels in 100 years due to climate change, notes Nikiforuk.
William Nitze, prominent member of the SPP and chairman of GridPoint Inc., a company that makes energy management systems, is not in favor of bulk water exports.
“Water management has been poor in all three countries,” Nitze said. Canada, for example, favors guidelines over mandatory rules for keeping pollutants out of water. And Mexico needs to double its investment in its water infrastructure, he noted.
Nikiforuk agrees that Canada has mismanaged its water resources. He points out that Canada already ships enormous volumes of water to the United States, in the form its main exports: grain, cattle, hogs, aluminum, automobiles and oil. Each of these requires many tons of water to produce, but the latter is perhaps the most controversial.
Most of Canada’s oil comes from the tar sands, a 125-billion-dollar capital project in the boreal forest of northern Alberta province. One million barrels of oil flow south each day to the U.S. making Canada its largest supplier.
However, it takes three barrels of freshwater to produce one barrel of oil from the tar sands, says Nikiforuk.
The project already consumes 359 million cubic metres of water, enough for a city of two million people in Canada. Ninety percent of the water becomes contaminated and has to be stored in vast tailings impoundments. More than 10 of these exist, covering an area of 50 square km.
Members of the SPP North American Energy Working Group met in Houston, in the southern U.S. state of Texas, in 2006, where they talked about the “pipeline challenge”, a proposed a five-fold increase in production at the tar sands, said Nikiforuk.
“No mention was made of water at the meeting, but there isn’t nearly enough water in the region for this kind of expansion,” he said.
Under NAFTA rules, Canada cannot reduce its energy exports to the United States, according to Gordon Laxer, director of the Parkland Institute, a research network at the University of Alberta. “The U.S. is the most energy wasteful nation on Earth. And Canada is sacrificing its environment to feed America’s addiction to oil,” Laxer said in an interview.
“Respected energy analyst Matthew Simmons told me Canada should stop furthering the U.S. addiction to liquid fuels and make it illegal to use fresh water in tar sands,” said Nikiforuk.
There is ample evidence that environmental standards and stewardship in Canada and Mexico have plummeted since NAFTA went into effect in 1994, and “accelerated trade under the SPP means accelerated environmental abuse,” he said.
(*Originally published by Latin American newspapers that are part of the Tierramérica network. Tierramérica is a specialised news service produced by IPS with the backing of the United Nations Development Programme and the United Nations Environment Programme.)
© 2007 Inter Press Service
I wish people would get pissed off and push lawmakers to repeal NAFTA already. Bush recently met with Calderón, the president of Mexico, to discuss EXPANDING NAFTA. EVERYBDOY is against NAFTA, and I mean EVERYBODY… immigrant rights activists, minutemen, union leaders, sweatshop workers, leftists, libertarians, environmentalists, organic food activists, local food activists, small business owners, family farmers, small town conservatives, anybody who is not a politician or a CEO. This is such bullshit.
Let’s write angry letters to our elected officials. Let’s get together and communicate and take to the streets. Let’s organize a mass strike or mass tax resistance. Dammit.
It’s time for a vote of no confidence vote in the current neo can government of Canada to force another federal election to put the Canadian people back in control of their government.
It seems that the only chance of eliminating the careless waste of water in Canada is a severe cross-country drought. Just like an abnormally mild winter caused more people to pay attention to global warming.
dtw what an excellent idea! Perhaps we could send it for express use by the White House, the VP, K street lobbyists and the congressional hacks who approved NAFTA.Don’t forget to also include the Clintons on the water deal.
Well, I think Harper is more interested in negotiating a water deal rather than face a future invasion by the US when water becomes a real crisis in the US. Remember: “You’re either with us, or with the terrorists.” Since Canada has already been labelled by the US “a haven for terrorists,” there is an excuse in place for any ulterior-motivated invasion. By handing over 70 percent of our oil reserves, we’re safe from invasion for oil.
There are many other reasons to fight SPP. Like common military command and control. How many Mexican and Canadian generals do you think will be involved there? How will “common command and control” allow Canada to keep the already-beleaguered “peace keeping” status of its military as the US gets involved in more resource wars like Iraq?
Another big issue is “harmonization” of the regulatory environment. If someone talks to you about “harmonization” and they aren’t in a barbershop quartet, please understand that they are talking about reducing the regulatory burden to the least common denominator. Canada and the US will end up with Mexico’s environmental regulatory system.
The third worrisome point is “labour mobility.” Internally, British Columbia and Alberta have implemented a “NAFTA on steroids” known as the Trade, Investment, and Labour Mobility Agreement (TILMA). It is oft-cited as a way for nurses and school teachers to work in either province, but it’s really a way for big business to bust unions and assure the cheapest possible labour force. Imagine it being illegal to pay a Canadian more than a Mexican would accept for the same work?
This “globaloney” can’t last. It’s built on a bubble of cheap energy, and the future lies in re-localization. But until it becomes too expensive to run trucks from Mexico City to Toronto on the new NAFTA superhighway being built, these agreements will cause a lot of damage, and make our necessary transition to a lower-energy future needlessly chaotic.
If the people of a country incorporate, its resources belong to the shareholders of the corporation (the people). We can have USA Inc. or Canada Inc., etc. Corporations are not subject to NAFTA or any other agreement between former countries pertaining to land, water, minerals, products or other assets and dividends belonging to its equal shareholders of non-transferable stock, The People Inc.
The Canadian minority government, calling itself Canada’s new government, headed by former National Citizen’s Coalition president (an organization dedicating itself to privatiziing health care - they love the American health care model with its corruption, and anything else that is not nailed down including water) and current Prime Minister of Canada, Stephen Harper, (Steve to Bush)is running a government by stealth holding secret meetings and showing contempt for citizens who oppose his views. To this end, he limits press conferences and relies more on press releases and the non interactional conveying of information. Is that not like Bush? HMMMMMMMM - we’re in trouble!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Canada should not be giving ANY water to the USA when they are using it to torture and waterboard political prisoners
I remember in the ’80s driving back to school in Vancouver, there was a message spray-painted on an overpass. It said ‘Free Canada trade Mulroney’. He should’ve been tried for treason along with the seperatist leaders.
I remember a joke going the rounds back then:
Q: What is fourteen inches long and hangs between Ronald Rayguns legs?
A: Lyin’ Brian Mulroney’s tie!
And now we see that despicable turd’s name being rehabilitated in the papers again, do they think that just cause we have turd II at the helm in Ottawa that the rat is allowed back? Dream on.
Back then most Canadians were willing to negotiate a free trade deal with the yanks but most Canadians did not trust the Mulroney gov’t to do an honest job of it. Time has proved us correct in that belief.
ezeflyer wrote: If the people of a country incorporate, its resources belong to the shareholders of the corporation (the people). We can have USA Inc. or Canada Inc., etc. Corporations are not subject to NAFTA or any other agreement between former countries pertaining to land, water, minerals, products or other assets and dividends belonging to its equal shareholders of non-transferable stock, The People Inc.
I’m not sure if the preceding was meant to be ironic, but I’d encourage you to view the film The Corporation before getting too excited about such a scheme.
In particular, the modern corporation is required by law to maximize return to investors, and is thus one of the primary mechanisms by which humanity is rapidly converting natural resources into pollution and garbage.
A better model is the cooperative association, which is not limited by law to maximizing investor return.
A cooperative typically has democratic (one member, one vote) decision making versus the financial (one dollar, one vote) decision making process in corporations. Cooperatives can have non-discriminatory restrictive membership, such as requiring members to agree to a set of principles — as long as anyone of any colour, race, etc. can agree to those principles and become members, whereas the only limit on corporations’ membership is the financial ability to buy shares. Cooperatives also may have operating criteria, goals, and strategies that include factors other than financial return on investment.
In British Columbia (at least), cooperatives are very easy and inexpensive to set up. You don’t need a lawyer if you can force yourself to think like one for a while in order to pick a template and modify it appropriately.
Contemporary corporations are part of the problem. Be a part of the solution — form a cooperative!
Jan Steinman wrote:
“‘ezeflyer wrote: If the people of a country incorporate, its resources belong to the shareholders of the corporation (the people). We can have USA Inc. or Canada Inc., etc. Corporations are not subject to NAFTA or any other agreement between former countries pertaining to land, water, minerals, products or other assets and dividends belonging to its equal shareholders of non-transferable stock, The People Inc.’
I’m not sure if the preceding was meant to be ironic, but I’d encourage you to view the film The Corporation before getting too excited about such a scheme.
In particular, the modern corporation is required by law to maximize return to investors, and is thus one of the primary mechanisms by which humanity is rapidly converting natural resources into pollution and garbage.
A better model is the cooperative association, which is not limited by law to maximizing investor return.
A cooperative typically has democratic (one member, one vote) decision making versus the financial (one dollar, one vote) decision making process in corporations. Cooperatives can have non-discriminatory restrictive membership, such as requiring members to agree to a set of principles — as long as anyone of any colour, race, etc. can agree to those principles and become members, whereas the only limit on corporations’ membership is the financial ability to buy shares. Cooperatives also may have operating criteria, goals, and strategies that include factors other than financial return on investment.
In British Columbia (at least), cooperatives are very easy and inexpensive to set up. You don’t need a lawyer if you can force yourself to think like one for a while in order to pick a template and modify it appropriately.
Contemporary corporations are part of the problem. Be a part of the solution — form a cooperative!”
Jan, I’m perfectly serious. No one has yet shot any holes in the apparently ludicrous idea of incorporating We the People. We’re all for maximizing investor return as long as We the People are the shareholding investors.
Incorporating We the People into a private, for profit corporation can give us a level playing field against the warmongering financial institutions and corporations of the oligarchy.
We could charge broadcasters a realistic fee for the use of our public airwaves, charge the oil companies for the use of our public lands and a fair percentage from the oil extracted (like Chavez does), charge the mining industry for a percentage of our minerals extracted, and on and on.
If We the People Inc. had equal, non-transferable shares in our trillions of dollars worth of our public resources, then these would truly belong to all of us. The dividends we received from leasing them would lift many Americans out of
poverty.
As a for profit corporation, We the People could have an administration that works for us, instead of for other corporations. And we could vote to hire and fire them at yearly stockholders meetings according to their performance, just as all other corporations do. We the People Inc. would make major decisions, not the oligarchy’s politicians.
As a corporation, We the People could decide to do business only with ethical corporations that will not pollute our air, water and land. That would not sacrifice our young for war profiteering and give us world peace. That would carry out the democratic will of We the People, not of other corporations and financial institutions of the oligarchy.
We could pay our corporate administrators fair salaries from the dividends we accrue and decide how much we want to spend on defense. We could buy out many industries to the point that We the People would be the largest corporation, working for our collective benefit.
We mostly dislike or even hate corporations for good reason, yet we continue to buy their cars, gas, shop at their mega-stores, watch their tv programs, etc.. Corporations as faceless machines that produce money often work against the public interest. Their economies of scale guarantee that they will stay on their mindless money-making paths until they destroy the planet unless We the People beat them at their own game.
We can complain loudly and constantly, but as individuals, we are fairly powerless against corporations. That is unless we turn things on their head and organize by incorporating ourselves.
By becoming a corporation, We the People will be the largest, richest and most powerful corporation against which all others will be forced to compete.
Coops are a great idea but since they can’t compete with large corporations, they stay Mom and Pop and go under when COSTCO, Wal-Mart, Mitsubishi and other conglomerates that the large majority depend on, show up.
AD wrote: “It’s time for a vote of no confidence vote in the current neo can government of Canada to force another federal election…”
The very real danger there is that the Conservatives would be returned to government but this time with a possible majority. In case you missed it, the Liberals got trounced in the recent byelections illustrating how ineffective Dion is as leader of the Liberals. And Canada’s only other choice is a seperatist organization or the NDP. As much as I would like the NDP to have a shot at governing, I don’t think the majority in Canada would agree.
The only way to proceed is to bring public attention to bear on these issues in Canada and at the moment, I don’t hear so much as a whisper about this issue.
Oh, and ezeflyer - it’s time to get realistic. We have a government in Canada, not a corporation. Work with it.
commonman, you know what they say about insanity.