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Flow How did a handful of corporations steal our water

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There's a battle going on for the source of life, water. Our corporate media isn't saying much about it, but across the globe citizens are struggling against transnational corporations like Nestle and Vivendi which are seizing the dwindling fresh water supplies. It's an absolutely critical topic that this film explains in an informative and inspiring fashion. "Flow" takes us to Bolivia Cochabamba!: Water War in Bolivia, South Africa, India Water Wars: Privatization, Pollution, and Profit, Michigan and beyond; and introduces us to the people who are being harmed by corporate tyrannies that are claiming the water of their land. Big businesses are making a fortune as they pollute or divert water supplies, or bottle it for sale at prices that the world's poor cannot afford.
People in the wealthy nations may feel they are immune from this crisis, but they too are being ripped off by the bottled water racket and poisoned by the continuing toxification of water with synthetic chemicals Toxic Legacy: Synthetic Toxins in the Food, Water and Air of American Cities.
"Flow" features many heroes we don't yet know the names of, like Vandana Shiva and Maude Barlow; but we are fortunate they have been slowing the march of the corporate fundamentalists The Corporation. People concerned about health and justice will want to contribute to the cause of water rights for humans, not for CEOs. Buying and sharing this film is a great first step. Subscribing to magazines like Onearth also helps, as the Natural Resources Defense Council is featured in this film due to the research and litigation they've been advancing on this and so many other pressing environmental issues.
Parts of this film will anger the viewer, but that mood is a natural and necessary part of the process toward social change. The film ends on an optimistic note about the power of the people, something that elites have feared for centuries The Chomsky Sessions: Noam Chomsky On The World.
Let's make the change we and our children so desperately need Yes!.

See also:
Bottlemania: How Water Went on Sale and Why We Bought It
Blue Gold: The Fight to Stop the Corporate Theft of the World's Water
Water Consciousness

I work in the water field where protecting our water supply and paying attention to when and how it is used, and this video was even an eye opener for me. The case for greed is the platform at hand as always, the almighty dollar. The problem comes down to demand. If we as stewards of the earth stop buying the products, i.e. bottled water, the demand would dwindle and the lack of attractiveness of the industry's drain on the earth's water would help preserve this natural resouce for generations to come.
Walk away from, Coca Cola, Nestle and Pepsi bottled water. Look at the label. Pay attention and just do your part.

This film shows how corporations are claiming water rights across the globe. Using the IMF and World Bank they are forcing third world countries to privitize their water systems. After this is done, the poor are unable to purchase the water.

Water is the next "blue gold." A must see film.

Length:: 5:29 Mins

The film "FLOW: For Love Of Water" is one of the most important water films of recent years. If you have any interest in your health, the health of your children and of our global civilization - then you should borrow FLOW from your local library or purchase it through AMAZON. In the film FLOW you will learn how over 30,000 people die each day from water-related diseases, and how contaminated water is one of the greatest killers of people in history. You will learn how birth defects and other health problems are substantially higher in areas located near large agricultural zones.

Flow will also bring you up-to-date on what is inside the bottled water you drink, how you can save money and by drinking tap water, and how the some water bottlers are taking control of water sources while destroying ecosystems. The film informs us about how over 30,000 people die each day from water-related diseases. In the film we learn how birth defects and other health problems are substantially higher in areas located near large agricultural zones.

In the film FLOW you will learn how control of water translates into power through economic control of money, how control of water translates into the power to control people in small communities, major cities and even entire countries - and, how control of water translated into ultimate power over life and death - which flows into which areas of the world will have healthy and wealthy people with long life spans - and which areas will have poverty and unhealthy people with short life spans. In other words, a subtle form of planned genocide.

The foundations of the information provided by FLOW can be found in books such as, The Holy Order of Water: Healing the Earth's Waters and Ourselves, by William E. Marks; Blue Covenant: The Global Water Crisis and the Coming Battle for the Right to Water, by Maude Barlow; The World's Water 2008-2009: The Biennial Report on Freshwater Resources, by Peter Gleick et al., and Water Wars: Privatization, Pollution, and Profit, by Vandana Shiva.

In the film FLOW you will find answers - as to how to create and manage low-tech water management for your home and your community. Why you should stop using bottled water. And, learn how you can help the world's water through some simple changes in your personal behavior, through changes in the way you spend your money and your time.

In the film FLOW you will learn how the answer to the world's water crisis does not exist with our governments, or with our transnational corporations - no - the answer to the world's water crisis exists in the hearts and minds of people who work together in a concerted effort with an all-embracing water philosophy.

Of the films I've seen and books I've read about current topics, this is the first that I genuinely feel compelled to recommend that everyone should get. It's not possible to understate the significance of the subject - access to decent water - or to overstate the growing threat from the giant water congromerates. The film focuses on three corporations primarily - Thames Water, Vivendi, and Suez. Suez, the French company, has been around for 150 years, so it's gotten quite a good start. Almost no one in the US has ever heard of these companies because they operate mostly in the "third world" and in growing markets like India. The film traces their path across the world; and shows the devastation left in their wake. However, the film also showcases the few instances where the people of a region have been successful in taking back their water, or at least holding off the companies' attempts to corner the market. The culprit is generally the same throughout the third world: the World Bank, which keeps lending money to impoverished areas then demands, as payback, the privitization of public utilities - electricity and water - which results in massive increases in the cost of these utilities. And, of course, the biggest ally privitization has is corrupt governments. The single most compelling piece of the entire film is about a community in India, in an essentially barren region, which built - literally stone by stone - a system of canals to catch and hold what little rain there was. This community created a lush, self-sustaining eco-system which brings in extra cash by permitting it to sell the excess crops. Now, facing the central Indian government's new mandates to make water a for-profit resource, it may become illegal for this community to keep the water it collects. Then, just when you might think this is all other people's problems, the film focuses on a water bottling plant in upstate Michigan which extracts the clean water, replaces it with polluted water, and gets a 90-year tax break to do so. The citizens are fighting the plant; they won the first round in court; but so far the appeals courts are siding with the plant against the community. Nor is this Michigan plant the only one in the US. The problem, like anything left unchecked, is growing exponentially.

The documentary Flow: For Love of Water, an official selection of the 2008 Sundance Film Festival, is well worth your time. The overall question this film poses to the viewer is should water be a natural resource that is allowed to be privatized. So the clash between public and private interests is at the heart of this film. The film makes the thesis that a developing "water cartel" is in the making that could have a disastrous impact on the worlds poor, the ecosystem, and local communities. There are several angles about water politics that the film explores in terms of different parts of the world, such as India, South Africa and a Mecosta County, a small county in northern Michigan that is trying to fight Nestle Corporation over a water bottling plant. This is also a story about grassroots organizing and the legal system.

This film would be excellent for an economics class at the college and high school level, as well any government course or current events class. U.S. History courses could adapt this film if they teach about the environmental movements in U.S. History as well as the role of government in people's lives. The film asks the viewer to consider: "is water and access to it a fundamental human right?"

The only disappointing thing for me was that the nice packaging the DVD came in, which is non-plastic, did not have a booklet with it, which would have made this film's message and places to contact for more information more accessible to people. An area the film does not deal with in detail is the massive demand for products that need water as an ingredient, such as soft drinks, juices, and beer to name a few. While Coca Cola is mentioned briefly, bottled water companies, such as Nestle, seem to be at the heart of the film makers concern. There is much food for thought in this film.

I have shared this video with many people - which is the reason I purchased it. I have yet to hear anyone say this hasn't changed the way they look at water and how they use water. This is very important film which everyone should see!!! It changes your perspective without insult or injury. You will never be quite the same.

Just watched this compelling film about the scarcity of clean water on the planet. Filmmaker Irena Salina, inspired by an article in The Nation called "Who Owns Water", sounds the alarms, exposing how huge corporations are "privatizing" the world's fresh water supply. Often this comes at the expense of the people upon whose land this water freely flows -- people are displaced from their homes and farms with promises of new homes and clean water systems which are never delivered, while the corporations pollute the environment and destroy the ecosystem. In some cases, the corporations leave inadequate water for the people whose land they have overtaken or offer to sell back that water at prices the poorest communities simply cannot afford.

Water is necessary for life, yet unclean water carries diseases that kill more people each year than AIDS or war. Human beings cannot survive even more than a few days without clean water to drink, but when water is privatized and then only offered for sale to people who have no means to pay the inflated price, the only option is to drink what dirty water can be found. And, lest we think clean water is only a problem in the world's poorest countries, the film points out that the water system in the United States is contaminated by pollutants including toxic waste, pesticides (that are illegal in other civilized countries) and pharmaceuticals we see advertised on TV every day.

While the information is alarming (the water supply is running out in as little as five years for some parts of the country, bottled water is no safer than tap, and there is barely one person at the EPA overseeing the safety of our drinking water) and the corporate greed that threatens to control our access to clean water is frightening -- there is some hope: the films shows examples of ordinary people who organize protests and sometimes emerge victorious in their fight for free access to water.

In 1948, the United Nations created a "Universal Declaration of Human Rights", which has 30 articles of agreement. On the 60th anniversary of this historic achievement, the filmmakers spoke at the U.N., proposing the addition of Article 31 which states, "Everyone has the right to clean and accessible water, adequate for the health and well-being of the individual and family, and no one shall be deprived of such access or quality of water due to individual economic circumstance." You can view the video to the UN presentation and add your name to the petition at [...].

~ D.Reed is the Founder of [...]

My sister suggested I watch this film after I had read a book by Maude Barlow about the global water crisis. And crisis it is. In too many areas of the world people struggle to survive with no access to clean water. In those areas that are fortunate to have what seems to be an abundance of clean water, the well is running dry, a result of wasteful use, mismanagement, and natural conditions.

Flow is a wakeup call for the complacent and the unimformed, for the myopic and the insulated. This is a powerful, dynamic film that is both memorable and disturbing. Watch it, and never think of megacorporations Pepsi, Coca Cola ,or especially Nestle in the same light again.

Clean water and access to it is fundamental for humans to survive. Sadly, this precious resource is becoming more rare, if not, close to extinction (yes!) in some parts of the world, creating a modern "trail of tears," an exodus of environmental refugees, and ultimately deaths. Unfortunate also is the fact that many policy makers are "commodifying" this basic human need to quench one's thirst, that is, selling it to the highest bidder. This film cogently portrays the extent and seriousness of this problem and argues, with convincing examples, for global cooperation to adequately replenish and equitably distribute this essential life force. Its conclusion that there ought to be an additional article to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a document increasingly referred to as customary international law which all nations must abide, that guarantees clean water as a human right is especially convincing. This film is a must see for anyone concerned about their fellow men and women.