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Promoting a sustainable energy future
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  Women and Water PrivatizationMae V. Buenaventura, Jubilee South Asia-Pacific mae@jubileesouth.org Water privatization affects everyone, but perhaps none as stark as where women of poor, marginalized communities are concerned. Yet this occurrence does not present itself simply, in the same way as, say, the obviously added burden of increased water rates on the general consuming public. And unless one looks at water privatization through sharp gender lenses, the specific consequences for women of such policies as water privatization would largely pass unnoticed, just as women’s work and contributions to society have remained hidden from plain view. One bold approach in surfacing these gendered impacts has come by way of the feminist economists whose perspective on the concept of the “care economy” allows recognition and understanding of how tightly linked women are to water resources and access and why they are among those hardest hit by water privatization. A main feature of the feminist economics paradigm is that it “…redefines the economic sphere of inquiry around the concept of provision for human life”. [1] Unfettered by mainstream economics’ preoccupation with markets and the so-called efficient or rational utilization of resources to their most productive use, they are able to uncover and answer a whole range of questions that neoclassical economists simply ignore or assume are taken care of. This is not to say that mainstream economists have not looked into the household for answers but they are blinded by the belief that work is divided rationally and harmoniously among men and women in household production. Writes economist Maria Sagrario Floro of the New Household Economics promoted among others by Gary Becker [A Treatise of the Family, 1991]: “The parallels between gender norms which permeate the market economy and household division of labor itself are obvious…[The] New Household Economics insists that the prevailing division of labor within the family is a matter of individual choice. The apparent inequality in the household division of labor is not questioned at all but is taken as an outcome driven by rational choice and individual preferences.” In other words, it asserts that women are naturally (even happily) inclined to do housework while men are much more bent towards working outside the home and earning a living; women, therefore, have the comparative advantage in attending to household chores relative to men.[2] Under this prevailing institutionalization of women’s inferior status within and outside the household, it is a tacit assumption that someone will pay for the decision to relinquish to private interests previously publicly-held commitments for the provision of basic services, as what happens under water privatization. Women, by virtue of these traditionally sacrosanct gender inequities within and outside the household, inevitably bear the differential impacts. “Rationalization and reduction of governmental benefits culminate in a shifting of social services from the paid to the unpaid sector, where these services are compensated by women in the households or the communities as an ‘unpaid honorary position.’”[3] From the feminist economist’s eye, the picture is vastly different, for it is in these indiscernible, economically unvalued places in the reproductive economy that goods and services essential to the maintenance of human life are provided and rendered free by women. These include a wide assortment of services such as child-rearing, food production, meal preparation, laundry, gardening, cleaning, etc., that require an adequate supply of clean and affordable water. Thus, any policy or program that treats water as a commodity rather than a part of the commons, and impinges on the household’s capacity to access water resources and services, impacts negatively on the quality of women’s lives. Reducing water as an economic good available only to those with the capacity to pay is immediately prejudicial of the poor. But it further discriminates against poor women and girls who are at the outset already underprivileged by their status in the household and in the larger society, and constrained by the limited access to resources like credit and owning land. Significantly, international financial institutions like the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) hold gender considerations high in the development and poverty reduction projects and programs that they fund. Marking International Women’s Day last year for instance, the ADB joined other multilateral institutions in “affirming the importance of promoting gender equality and empowering women.” John Lintjer, ADB Vice-President for Finance and Administration, was quoted as saying that "it is especially important that we at ADB mark the occasion, for the very nature of our business - reducing poverty - goes to the heart of the challenge faced by many of the women in the Asia-Pacific region.” He added that "any sustainable strategy for poverty reduction must aim at promoting gender equality."[4] The World Bank makes the same assertion, citing “…strong empirical evidence that the gender-based division of labor and the inequalities to which it gives rise tend to slow development, economic growth and poverty reduction. Gender inequalities often lower the productivity of labor, both in the short and long term, and create inefficiencies in labor allocation in households and the economy at large. They also contribute to poverty and reduce human well-being. These findings make clear that gender issues are an important dimension of the World Bank's fight against poverty.”[5] All these fall flat in the face of how the privatization experience has actually played out for Filipino women. The Philippine water privatization deal[6] is the first in the region and the largest of its kind anywhere in the world terms of an 11-million service population and $7.5 billion in investment requirements.[7]Lauded as a paragon of success in injecting efficiency into the sector, lowering rates and expanding access for poor communities and particularly for poor women, it has ironically highlighted the very opposite: Water privatization, is one such policy that “…perpetuates gender inequalities by relying on traditional gender roles that have made women and girls responsible for and the main suppliers of water to their families and households”. [8] Only five years into the 25-year concession contract, this undertaking already bears out many flaws that are repeated in alarming fashion in other parts of the world as the drive to privatize the world’s water resources and services intensifies. Stressing this, Sara Grusky wrote: “…Most major water privatizations are less than a decade old, but already it appears clear that they follow the pattern of privatization in other service sectors—no commitment to expanded access to low-income consumers, inequity in the quality of service based on the ability to pay, service cut-offs, weak regulatory oversight, and lack of accountability to local consumer needs.”[9] The Philippines captures a major 1990s trend showing a rise in the entry of foreign private sector multinationals in the water systems of developing countries, a market they had previously left untouched. It appeared that “the increase was often due to pressure exerted on developing countries by international financial institutions…, both in direct conditionality attached to the provision of their loans.”[10] At the time of privatization, in 1995, the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) owed the ADB US$250 million out of the US$307 million long-term loans that formed part of its total US$800 million debt.[11] By the close of 1995, the government of President Fidel Ramos had contracted the International Finance Corporation – the private investment arm of the World Bank – to design the MWSS privatization strategy for a fee of US$6.2 million.[12]Ramos acted on the strength of emergency powers secured in June that year through the passage of the National Water Crisis Act, which provided for the privatization of any or all segments of the MWSS and the Local Water Utility Administration, including its operations and facilities. In August 1997, the operations and management of the country’s water sector facility, the MWSS, passed on to two private concessionaires who won in the bidding. They are each controlled by the Ayalas and the Lopezes, landed clans of the Philippine elite, who partnered at the time of the sale with the foreign water firms Suez Lyonnaise des Eaux[13](Lopez), and Northeast Water and Bechtel (Ayala). Hardly any public consultations were conducted before government signed the management contract with these two concessionaires, writes Violeta Corral who cites this admission by no less than the MWSS administrator at the time, Angel Lazaro. “Especially lacking,” she notes “was consultations with women and urban poor groups; at the very least, women should have been consulted about their willingness to pay for privatized services.”[14] As proposed by the IFC, the concession-type water privatization model covered water treatment, distribution, tariff collection, facility improvement and overall management. It seemed that government had made a sound deal by passing on MWSS’ $800 million debt to the water concessionaires, as well as the responsibility of subsidizing the public services that MWSS had previously rendered to Metro Manila consumers. The public sector was also deemed more efficient and being ostensibly less politicized, would not be as vulnerable as public officials to graft and corruption.[15] The two concessionaires – Manila Water Company and the Maynilad Water Services Inc. further committed themselves to delivering a range of promises in their respective zones (East and West) that included the assurance that in the first 10 years of privatization, rates would only inch up with inflation. Maynilad, as concessionaire for the larger part of the MWSS area, agreed to pay government concession fees that would cover the servicing of 90 percent of MWSS’ debts. Both firms also projected:[16]
Downsizing The impact of privatizing the water facility was harsh and immediate for thousands who were either displaced or had no other option but to accept early retirement packages.[17] Of the total 7,370 MWSS employees, only one percent was left with the Residual MWSS[18] (48 percent women, 52 percent men). Six months later, the original MWSS workforce further shrank by 40 percent due to so-called early retirement (27 percent) and voluntary/ involuntary separation (13 percent). Also because of the privatization, both female and male employees close to 15 years of services forfeited lifetime pension benefits. Many of these were women.[19] According to Lou Labrador, one of the female employees interviewed by Corral in 1999, female employees, especially the old timers in support staff positions (clerks, typists, administrative), chose early retirement because they feared they could not ‘compete.’ They also felt that they fell short of the necessary skills (such as using computers) to survive in the new set up. Beth Nuyad, a civil engineer and head of the MWSS Employees Union who declined the private offer and eventually lost her job clearly expressed her co-workers’ sentiments to the Philippine Daily Inquirer in June 1997: “We want job security, not early retirement.’”[20] The large number of women displaced as a result of the privatization of MWSS indicates how the market economy looks at women’s time in the reproductive economy – to be stretched or contracted at will, depending on what the market needs at a particular point in time. Simply, Floro points out, “…it opens its doors to women when it has need for their productive labor, but it just as quickly slams the door on them when it contracts or downsizes. The main premise here being that the reproductive economy, which is invisible, contracts or expands according to the needs of the market economy.”[21] Water rates increases After a mere two years of privatization, Maynilad and Manila Water began clamoring for rate increases and eventually found the opportunity to do so in the 2002 Rate Rebasing process, a review exercise stipulated on the 5th year of the 25-year management contract. In sum, Manila Water has had nine increases, bringing its current water tariff to PhP14.58 cu. m. from its dive bid of PhP2.32/cu. m. in 1997, which enabled it to win the East Zone concession area. Maynilad, for its part, would eventually register a 400 percent rise in rates from P4.96 cu. m. to Php24.27/ cu. m. from 1997 to 2003. A government clerk interviewed by Corral confided that she felt shortchanged after the MWSS increases: “Why do I feel that trickery is woven into what they’re [concessionaires’] saying. Rates should not increase but they are increasing. Consumers should protest the rates increases, which in less than five years are already taking place despite their claim that this would only happen after 10 years.”[22] Not only did water privatization proponents fail to adequately consult people on their willingness to pay; neither were women consulted on their ability to pay vis-à-vis the gendered way income and other resources are allocated within households. If the IFIs’ avowed concern for gender issues were not merely lip service, they should also have realized, as Julian Liu clarifies, that “women are often marginalized in monetary economy, and thus suffer when a price is put on water. Willingness- to-pay is not the same as the ability-to-pay, such assessments do not take into account the choices that poor women must make. Domestic or “reproductive” uses of water does not generate income directly, so benefits are not captured in traditional economic indicators.”[23] The lack of access to safe water Women in poor communities are often forced to make the difficult choice between feeding their families and paying for basic utilities like water and power. Illegal connections are thus not surprising where private concessionaires do not fulfill expansion targets or charge fees of PhP3-5,000 that are beyond the capacity of urban poor households in slum communities. This came sharply to attention in late 2003 when a scenario reminiscent of cholera epidemics in South Africa after water privatization measures were implemented in 2000 unfolded in various depressed communities in Metro Manila. At least seven people died and more than 700 became stricken with various gastro-intestinal-related complaints. Samples submitted by the Freedom from Debt Coalition (FDC) to the Natural Sciences Research Institute of the University of the Philippines showed 16 coliform bacteria per 100 ml of water – way above the Philippine national health standard of 2.2 coliform bacteria /100 ml of water. Visiting one of these areas in November 2003, FDC staff met a mother whose son remained confined after a week in the charity ward of public hospital because of a gastro-intestinal ailment. “I have to return every now and then to the hospital. Nobody else is available to take care of him there and at the same time, I have to find a way to source his medicines. It’s fortunate that there are neighbors who can look after my other children when I am away. His older sister also helps out when she is not in school.) Again, the burden of caring for the sick falls on women and girls, on top of other work within and outside the household.[24]There is no escaping that “question of gender inequity and the asymmetrical power relations that deprive women of resources while assigning them the most menial, difficult and unrewarding jobs and roles….”[25] Maynilad never owed up to its failure to maintain the required water pressure in their pipelines or the standard level of chlorine, which could have prevented inflows of contaminated water. Residents were squarely blamed even as the water concessionaire had only put in PhP8.96 billion, or 38 percent of the total PhP23.8 billion it had pledge to invest by end-2001 for the repair, rehabilitation and maintenance of Manila’s aging pipe networks.[26] The same habit of cutting corners ails the Ayalas’ Manila Water Company as well. A study conducted by the International Consortium for Investigative Journalism (ICIJ) showed the firm as having invested only PhP1.2 billion from 1997 – 2001, PhP5 million short of the PhP1.7 billion promised in its business plan.[27] Where profit and not public service is the driving motivation over, increased rates clearly provide no guarantee that funds will be channeled into providing adequate and safe water, especially to marginalized communities. Ironically, poor households that are unconnected to the piped grid system are forced patronize higher-priced water of uncertain quality from private vendors. Poor delivery of water services Those who do have piped water connections literally shell out hard-earned money for water that is neither continuously supplied nor fit to drink. It is the rule rather than the exception for many Metro Manila households to stay up late to collect water and do the laundry because the water supply comes at around 11 p.m. or midnight. Interviewed by Corral, a woman in one Quezon City neighborhood complained: “We used to have water the whole day but after water was privatized, we no longer have a regular supply. This disturbs my work schedule because I have to wait for the water to come to do the laundry. In the past, I would wash the clothes in the morning so that I could do other work in the afternoon. Now, the water I collect is just enough for my children who go to school. It seems like all my hours are spent here. I work even at night, doing the laundry. We also have to save on trips to the bathroom. Sometimes I would wait for the water to come before using the bathroom. My head often aches. But I have to wait for the water, otherwise our supply would be short of our needs. I have also been taking baths at night when there is water but my body is giving out….”[28] Manila residents would advise against drinking straight from the tap. Silted and heavily clouded, water in many parts of the metropolis has to be boiled before it can be safely consumed. Others are compelled to stretch household incomes even further by purchasing bottled water. The additional economic costs are immediately evident as budgets for education and basic health care, among others, are slashed to accommodate more urgent needs for food and water. Less obvious is the labor multiplied daily for women and stretches of time for education, rest and leisure irretrievably lost in trying to fit in all their work into 25-hour days. Jeopardizing missionary functions Women in the rural areas where support infrastructure is weakest, suffer a similar lengthening of labor hours because of traditional gender roles that assign them primarily to household production. For instance, the women in Zaragosa Island in the Cebu area of the Philippine archipelago have to paddle out to sea in small outrigger boats to a single communal faucet set up by the local government where they fill plastic containers, bathe and do the laundry. Agnes Balota narrates: “Many spend two hours per day paddling back and forth, on top of considerable time waiting for their turn at the tap. There are nine communal faucets on the island itself that give five hours of water service to 264 households. Given this condition, 30 households are clustered to one communal faucet averaging 10 minutes of water collection time per household only. This is why the people still prefer to paddle to the mainland to get their share of water.”[29] Obviously, there is little left of a woman’s day for activities critical to self-advancement and empowerment. But places like Zaragosa Island and many other remote areas in the Philippines have little hope of attracting investors under the water privatization scheme, which views water and water services as economic goods, and is hinged on the premise of financial viability and full cost recovery. The loans themselves that finance the privatization thrust of international financial institutions oblige governments to cut back subsidies and promote instead policies charging the consumer for the full cost of the operation and maintenance of the water utility service.[30] Corral rightly points out: “Privatization discourages the servicing of far-flung areas that are not ‘cost-effective,’ nor profit-generating”[31]since private companies will certainly only invest in infrastructure and services that are expected to turn out a profit. Again, this makes way for gender inequities to worsen and intensify. “Men’s work is considered a part of the productive economy of paid labor reflected in GNP growth and as such it is generally seen as more worthy,” writes Carsten Kloepfer. “As a result, there may be infrastructure investment for irrigation, but not for safe drinking water within cartage distance. Little consideration is given to women´s work and it´s not taken into account how much productivity would be freed up when women don´t have to compensate for bad water infrastructure.”[32] The challenges of surfacing the gender dimensions of water privatization The impacts of privatizing basic utilities are so far-reaching that people’s organizations and movements in both North and South have doubled efforts in doing research and coming out with rich material to stop this aggressive drive by multilateral financial bodies and giant corporations. Still, there is an ever-urgent need to highlight the specific impacts on women and girls of privatizing basic services like water. Women’s reproductive and productive contributions to society remain invisible, unvalued and unaccounted for; failing to surface the differential impacts of such government policies and programs as water privatization is bound to promote this invisibility and further deepen already well-entrenched gender inequalities. Fortunately, substantial work has been done towards developing tools that use gender as a major category of analysis. The Gender Disaggregation Method, for instance, is among the simplest ways of bringing to light the differential impacts of policies and programs on men and women, and in crafting gender-fair alternatives. It recognizes that gender relations are unequal and have been so structured by mainstream society, that policies and programs affect women and men differently. Privatization models, for instance, merely presuppose households’ willingness and the ability to pay. But the Gender Disaggregation Method would look more closely at intra-household data because it starts from the belief that unequal gender structures and relations within households affect the way priorities are set and how resources are accordingly distributed. It would ask questions like, Who primarily takes charge of ensuring water supply in the household? How much of the household members’ time (men and women) is spent on collecting water? Who is mainly responsible for chores linked to water access and use? (It is beyond the scope of discussion of this paper to go into the many other tools and frameworks of analysis that feminist economists have developed). However, disaggregating information is only a starting point. An even more vital challenge is taking action on these impacts and planning out alternatives to water privatization in a manner that ensures the democratic participation of women who after all carry out 80 percent of water-related work in throughout the world. ### References: [1]Floro, Maria Sagrario. Resource Book on Feminist Economics. Freedom from Debt Coalition. Quezon City: November 2002, pp. 41-42 more resources
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