Fiji Water(Or How To Destroy An Island)

[Nuala]

Fiji Water is bottled in the Republic of the Fiji islands. The population is about 175,000, it's now controlled by a military regime that took control via the 2006 Fijian coup d'etat. Water is imported into the US from the small island nation. About 1/4 of Fiji's people lack access to clean drinking water, leading to incidents of cholera and typhoid.

Fiji Water exports about 100 million liters of Fiji water a year. Fiji Water allegedly returns an amount of the money made to bring clean water to certain areas of Fiji. However, the Fiji capital of Suva has an undependable water system with a failing infrastructure. In July 2008, the Fijian government proposed a tax on bottled water in order to generate income and to help conserve the island's water resources.

In a span of a couple of weeks, the government had to abort the bottled water tax because of overt threats by the bottled water lobby. The threats occurred when bottling companies shut down factories, stating they could not operate under such a tax. The bottled water tax would have cost Fiji around 3 million USD in lost export revenues a week. The government dropped their proposed tax.

Fresh water on volcanic islands is rare due to the porous soils and rocks that make up such islands. Any fresh water water found on volcanic islands is valuable and important to the island's population. It supports the ecosystems of the island, and flows out into the ocean soon enough. Clean drinking water is obviously the most precious liquid on Earth. The Fijian people are obviously suffering to the country's dependance on bottled water companies for revenue, and the people don't have clean water as they should.

So, in the "green" attitude of the world, why is this still going on? It's absolutely deplorable that it's not often called out on. Considering the diesel factories the bottles are manufactured at in China, and the gas it takes to ship the bottles to the Fiji Islands, and then the whole process of bottling the water, and then shipping it out everywhere the demand for it's at, it's absolutely goddamn wasteful. To drink Fiji Water would be akin to being a super villain. Not only are you supporting corporate domination of a small island, but also a military coup, and the decreasing well being of the island's people.

Majority of post was copied from the article found here. How does JREF feel about Fiji Water?

 

[Half-n-Half]

Kind of surprised I never saw this topic.

So, in the "green" attitude of the world, why is this still going on?

Same reason so many things just as bad or worse still happen in the world: apathy and/or ignorance. Either not enough people care enough to do something, don't know about it, or both.

To drink Fiji Water would be akin to being a super villain. Not only are you supporting corporate domination of a small island, but also a military coup, and the decreasing well being of the island's people.

No, being akin to being a super villain would mean wearing a long cape, flying around, melting cities with eye beams, fighting the superhero, plotting to destroy the world, or all of the above. Equating someone who drinks Fiji Water to a villain isn't exactly fair, considering they might not even know the circumstances and are not knowingly doing anything wrong. The villain, however, does.

I don't drink Fiji Water in the first place, but hey, you convinced me not to. It does seem pretty wasteful, along with the other bottled water companies.

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

About 1/4 of Fiji's people lack access to clean drinking water, leading to incidents of cholera and typhoid.

That would be a sanitation issue then rather than the water companies fault. Typhoid & Cholera are very much hygiene related problems (raw sewage being the main causes), putting in better sanitation facilities and proper drains etc as well as educating people about hygiene would be the solution to this.

So, in the "green" attitude of the world, why is this still going on?

Meh, there's millions of environmental disasters going on right now (and this to be fair is not the worst that i've heard of), but it probably boils down to;
a. People are ignorant of this particular issue.
b. People are not ignorant of this particular issue but don't really care about it.
c. Some people are not ignorant of this issue & do care, but they make up the minority.

I've argued looong and haaard so many different moral issues, from battery farming to the problems of excess packaging on food etc. But depressingly if there's anything that i've learnt after years of debating this stuff, is that despite the miriad of excuses people often give to defend themselves over whatever issue is in question & why they don't do something about it etc, it really boils down to because people are;
a. Selfish
b. Greedy
c. Really just don't care. Even about the big picture stuff. As long as their own little personal or family world isn't negatively affected, that is.

To drink Fiji Water would be akin to being a super villain. Not only are you supporting corporate domination of a small island, but also a military coup, and the decreasing well being of the island's people.

Well i honestly didn't know anything about the Fiji bottled water issue, but if i see any where i live and have other water choices i will now know to avoid it (due to the environmental reasons) ^_^v .

 

[Haruspex]

Oh, but people love to champion all sorts of minor causes, most commonly with minor or no impact. Many people like to think that the issue is straightforward and uncomplicated, but that's not the case. It's like 'Oh, if I don't buy this and this and this and buy more of this and this, it's all going to be just fine.', but that's not the case. This whole bottled water thing is just a symptom and dealing with this particular symptom is not a solution to the problem itself. An oppressive regime will find a way to profit from the people. The problem is corruption and other forms of criminality and I think that if no one bought Fiji bottled water, the average person in Fiji would probably say to himself 'Great, we've got an oppressive regime, poverty, disease and death and no one's buying our ******* water!'

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

^ Yeah very true. Not buying bottled water is not going solve the countries much bigger picture problems.

 

[nice gaijin]

bottled water is probably one of the most wasteful and damaging products man has created. Most times it's just refiltered tap water, siphoned from a city's own water supply, taking something that's free and putting a label and a price tag on it. It takes more water to make the bottle than to fill it, and "recyclable" plastic bottles will never see life as a bottle again; most end up in plastic dumps in China or India, and may get recycled into low-grade plastic to be tossed later. "Recyclable" and "Recycled" are two very different things.

Fiji is just one example of another broken system.