FT.com reports:
Figures from other countries confirm the evidence: it is generally the poorest who pay most for what is one of the most essential of all natural resources. Water is in short supply for a large proportion of the world’s people: about 1bn lack access to clean water and 2.6bn have no sanitation. An estimated 5,000 children die every day from water-related disease, according to WaterAid, the London-based charity . . .
Most governments regulate the price of water but, because of the “perverse subsidies”, that often does not result in sensible water pricing. So Mr Brabeck-Letmathe has an alternative idea: water trading.
He compares the concept to carbon trading, which has put a price on emitting carbon dioxide in Europe. Under a so-called cap-and-trade mechanism, a limit is imposed on how much carbon companies can emit and allows them to trade their quotas with one another. A similar system with water would mean that businesses and farmers would be granted the right to use a certain amount of water. If they want to use more than their quota, they must buy the rights from other companies or farmers in the trading system . . .
