The True Price of Fiji Water

Last April I posted an item Why Fiji Water Will Never Be 'Green'.

Now comes William E. Marks and his post,The True Price of Fiji Water, on AlterNet.

Here's a teaser:

The small island nation of Fiji with its population of about 150,000 -- is now controlled by a military regime that took control via the 2006 Fijian coup d'état. With such an unstable government -- people suffer while some industries prosper. One of these prospering companies is Fiji Water. Water imported into the US from the small island nation of Fiji is ranked number 2 in bottled waters. France, of course, is number 1.

Today, about one-third of Fiji's people lack access to clean drinking water, leading to incidents of typhoid and other water-related diseases.

The irony of these statistics is that Fiji Water exported about 130 million liters of Fiji water in the past year. To present a "green face" to the world -- Fiji Water returns a token amount of money to bring clean water to certain areas of Fiji. However, according to a recent BBC investigation, the Fiji capital of Suva has an undependable water system with failing infrastructure.

Marks is off by a factor of almost 6 in his estimate of Fiji's population; it is about 850,000. I suspect he may be citing the population of the main island of Viti Levu, often referred to as 'Fiji'.

Give it a read, as well as the comments.

"No, San Pellegrino and Perrier got rich off the pretensions of liberal wastrels like moi who thought it set us apart from the unlettered masses. We ordered it in restaurants for the same reason we read books we don’t like and go to operas we don’t understand - we say to the waiter, ”Perrier,” to give a continental touch to our macaroni and cheese." -- Garrison Keillor, Salt Lake Tribune, 29 September 2007