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Water makes up almost 70 (seventy) percent of the human body and without it, it has been said that the body cannot be sustained and would therefore perish. Every nutrition class or article that I have ever read, has always touted water as the “elixir of life”. In my humble opinion that makes water a basic necessity for the sustainment of life and the access to free water a basic right for all people. However, if the water was on pre-owned property then it would not be considered free. “As the world’s water supply dwindles, communities in the United States and all over the world are organizing to take public control of their water systems and defend their human right to safe, affordable and accessible water” (Food & Water Watch, 2009).
In recent years, there has been an ongoing battle over water between local communities and the Nestle Corporation. According to several articles, including the Case Study 3.2, Battling over bottled water (Barry and Shaw, 2010, 2007, p139). Nestle has been taking over the water in small communities often using unfair practices. Several of these communities have in turn fought the company stating that among other things, Nestle is harming the environment and charging local citizens for their own water which would otherwise have been free. There are countless articles on the internet pertaining to Nestles’s acquisition of water sources and as far as I could find, none are favorable to the company or its practices.
The Sierra Club, a U.S.-based environmental organization and shareholder in Nestlé and Corporate Accountability International, led a gathering of concerned citizens at Nestlé's North American headquarters in the north-eastern city of Greenwich, Connecticut to call on the company to "respect the right of local communities to exercise democratic control over the use of their water."
"Water is essential to life on this earth and to the viability of
References: Locke, John, 1690, The Second Treatise of Government, ed. C.B. MacPerson, Indianapolis: Hackett 1980