| Program Process Started... |
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| Wednesday, 10 December 2008 | |
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The program process started for the Alternative Water Forum which will take place on 20-21-22nd of March 2009 at Bilgi University Santralİstanbul Campus. We will organize the program of the alternative forum with the principle of ‘unity in diversity’ which becomes concrete in the social forum processes. In this respect, if you accept the call of the campaign , you can propose an activity to the alternative water forum in the name of your organization . It is enough to fill and send this form to This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it . Please click on read more to see the details of the preparations. Short links to contents:· Introduction · What does the Turkish Government expect from World Water Forum? · How will the social movements react to World Water Forum in Turkey? · The program process of Alternative Water Forum for the Campaign Themes Activities, types of the meetings · Logistics · International Preparatory Assembly, 17th January ’09 in Istanbul · Contact · Activity proposal form · About the Campaign and the list of member organizations Introduction: Turkey will host a very important meeting in March in 2009. The 5th World Water Forum will be gathering in Istanbul in order to discuss the water policies of the world. In the forum dominated by state administrations and private companies, the entities who have been the creators of the ‘water’ problem so far will seek for the ‘solution’ of the problem. One of the most important agenda of the forum is that the opening of the water sources and investments such as dams etc to the privatization process. We, movements representing a broad scale of the society, say that water is a basic human and social right and another water management is possible. We call for a management of our water resources which meets the need of people and not companies or other circles and we aim healthy water ecosystems - a very important basis of our existence. We will hold the Alternative Water Forum in Istanbul in March in 2009 with many social movements in the world. We call everybody to participate in this process in which we will discuss various titles about water and have activities and demonstrations against World Water Forum which sees water as a profit area. What does the Turkish Government expect from World Water Forum? Mr. Veysel Eroglu who is the Minister of Environment of Turkey, made a remarkable call to the businessman in September 2008: ‘Come and invest your money on water.’ In order to convince the private water companies to invest water in Turkey, he added that two main areas are attractive: dams and water distribution services. According to the Minister, the potential water market in Turkey is about 60 billions €, and 90% of it is the dam projects, mostly for hydro energy and some for irrigation. Turkish Government made legal arrangements in the previous years to get investment on water by the public-private partnerships. There are lots of investment tax incentives for water companies. In the web site of DSI (General Directorate of State Hydraulic Works of Turkey) it said that there are 1400 dam projects which are already applied for license. Besides, there are about 600 dam projects which will be conduct by DSI. They declare that there will be an addition of 10 thousands MWs to the yearly electricity production of Turkey, obviously without taking into the consideration of the environmental and social impacts of this ‘development plan’. Just to give two examples about the environmental and social impacts: In the Black Sea Region of Turkey there is a plan to build 50 dams on one river. The Ilisu dam project on the Tigris River will cover an area of 313 km2 with its lake. A historical city of 10.000 years past called Hasankeyf is about to be destroyed with this project. Till today more than 350.000 people have been displaced by dam projects in Turkey. On the other side, there are discussions on how to privatize the water distribution services. There were detailed discussions on this aspect in a preparatory meeting of World Water Forum in September which was organized by TUSIAD (Turkish Industrialists’ and Businessmen’s Association) with the participation of Loïc Fauchon, President of the World Water Council. The main focus of this discussion was to privatize some services in distribution systems like cleaning systems etc by public private partnerships. But the privatization of the whole systems is not an immediate solution for government due to some bad experiences in Turkey. In a report which was presented in this meeting proposed to accept water as a human right to control the price of water, then immediately privatize. This picture may help us to figure out what the World Water Forum which will be held on 16-22 March 2009, means for Turkish Government: It will help to the Government to convince the public opinion for a development plan which will mean the destruction of environment and social structures on lots of locals. Furthermore, it will be an opportunity to advertise the ‘water market’ in Turkey to the multinational companies. If you consider that the Forum will take place just one week before the local elections in Turkey (29th of March will be the local elections), the whole World Water Forum event may also be a great tool for the election campaign of neoliberal governing party AKP and the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality which is the main sponsor of the formal Forum. How will the social movements react to World Water Forum in Turkey? The preparatory process of the World Water Forum in Turkey is neither transparent nor participatory. Furthermore it is organized by World Water Council which not legitimate in the international policy making process and it is dominated by the water companies. Our priority as the movements in the Another Water Management is Possible Campaign is to organize an Alternative Water Forum which will reflect that another water policy is possible. We will organize this alternative forum on 20-21-22th of March 2009 in SantralIstanbul with many social movements and with the support of the local governments and MPs who are opposing neoliberal policies. We will also organize some events ‘inside’ in order to give visibility the voice of public water. We are working with some local governments on this aspect. The program process of Alternative Water Forum for the Campaign We will organize the program of the alternative forum with the principle of ‘unity in diversity’ which becomes concrete in the social forum processes. In this respect, you can propose an activity to the alternative water forum considering the points below. 1- Themes: We as the Campaign which will host the forum on 20-22th March, had a successful preparatory assembly on 15th of November in Istanbul with approx. 25 different NGOs. As a result of the fruitful discussions of the Assembly, we decided to give priority to the points related to the themes below. Please mind that you can make new proposals for the themes until 17th of January, which is the date of International Preparatory Assembly.
2- Activities, types of meetings
Contact
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