When you think of CEOs of big corporations, the first thing that comes to mind is greed. It seems these companies are built around maximizing profit for themselves, regardless of the damage they cause. Recently a video has surfaced of the founder and chair member of the Nestle Corporation claiming that water should not be a basic human right and that water supply control should be privatized. Nestle is the largest producer of food in the world; controlling water supplies would almost give them a monopoly.
There are an infinite number of reasons why water should not be privatized, the largest one being the impact of that on the poor communities. Living paycheck-to-paycheck, spending the entirety of their money on groceries and rent, these people might not be able to pay for the extra cost of water. Humans need water to survive. We cannot live two days without it, let alone wait a week for the next paycheck. Giving that level of power to a corporation could have a drastic effect on the population. The poor and homeless population would suffer immensely.
There’s also a massive sociological effect that would happen if water became privatized. We would be giving up a basic human right, and giving it to a corporation to sell and control. We would no longer see that corporation as just a corporation; we’d be forced to view it as a necessity, a life source. The company would control the water supply (we need water to live) and therefore the company would, in a sense, control us. The amount of power we would be giving them would be extremely dangerous. Would it stop there, though? If water can be taken away from us, who’s to say they won’t tax us for how many breaths we take? It would open Pandora’s box, allowing the companies to control us even more. They would own our freedom.
Does a company like Nestle even need that money? Last year, Nestle made a whopping $258 billion. The CEO of Nestle earned around $11 million. Having too little money here isn’t an issue for Nestle—they want privatized water for the power of it. This isn’t the first time Nestle has done something shady, either. In 2012, they got caught investing money in plans to cease the advancement of GMO (genetically modified organisms) labeling. GMO labeling has been a big issue in recent years due to the concern that GMOs are potentially harmful. Nestle clearly isn’t a fan of GMO labeling, giving another reason not to trust this company.
We shouldn’t allow companies to get to this level of greed and power. Basic human rights are rights for a reason; we deserve them. What we don’t deserve are companies trying to take that away from us for profit and control.