Madagascar vs. South Korea
( TheSaiko.com )
Water shortages are a growing problem, but not for the reasons most people think. What if we were to tell you that Daewoo, the South Korean corporate giant, inked a deal in March of 2009 to lease more than half of Madagascar’s arable land? What if we were to also tell you that the reason for this was to growing fear of the lack of water in South Korea and their needs for an increased food supply? We think it has the makings of a James Bond movie.
The terms of the deal, not surprising to anybody at The Saiko, were less than favorable for the citizens of Madagascar. Now that there is a new president, that deal has been scrapped. Overall, corporations like Daewoo and Coca Cola are setting themselves up to be “targets” for governments, communities and water conservation groups. Between the state of California in the USA, Australia’s decade-long drought and Brazil’s frequent brownouts, the demand and fight for water only stands to escalate.
A startling piece of data is that more and more of the world’s most important rivers no longer connect with the sea: Colorado, Yellow, Indus and the Rio Grande. This is solely attributed to said water supplies being diverted to grain growing. Sounds like Daewoo and South Korea are not alone in this situation.
The 2 biggest contributing factors are:
- jump in world population from 3 to 6.5 bilion
- climate change
The bad news is that both of these trends are slated to escalate tremendously over the next 3 decades.
