Where the Poor Pay More for Water

Published on Thursday, April 9, 2009 by Inter Press Service
Where the Poor Pay More for Water
by Ángel Páez

LOMAS DE MANCHAY, Peru - In Lomas de Manchay, an area of slum-covered hills outside of the Peruvian capital that is home to 50,000 people, mainly poor indigenous migrants from the highlands, clean water is worth gold - almost literally.

Local residents of the shantytown pay 3.22 dollars per cubic metre of water, compared to just 45 cents of a dollar that is paid a few blocks away, across the main avenue, in Rinconada del Lago, one of Lima's most exclusive neighbourhoods.

"The contrast vividly illustrates the inequality in the distribution of water," María Teresa Oré, lead author of the new book "El agua ante nuevos desafíos. Actores e iniciativas en Ecuador, Perú y Bolivia" (roughly "New Challenges Facing Water; Actors and Initiatives in Ecuador, Peru and Bolvia"), told IPS.

The book is a study of the situation in those three countries by the development and relief agency Oxfam International.

"The poor have the least access to water; this is a pattern that was seen over and over in the countries we studied," said Oré.

"There is a gap between rich and poor. The rich pay less than the poor for drinking water - an offensive, shocking, insulting reality," Abel Cruz, the head of the Peruvians without Water Movement (MPSA), told IPS.

More:
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/04/09-9