Bottled Water con being targeted by NSW government
THE NSW State Government has followed the lead of the Southern Highlands village of Bundanoon, and moved to ban commercially bottled water in all government departments and agencies.
NSW Premier Mr Rees said he had asked the Department of Premier and Cabinet and the Department of Environment and Climate Change to come up with ways to "significantly reduce" bottled water use.
Huw Kingston, the Bundanoon cafe and bike shop owner who developed the idea of a ban, said his community was strongly supporting such a ban.
"We're not trying to save the world by doing this - it's a small step - but it's time somebody stood up to this wonderful marketing con job that says we will sell you water at 300 times the price of water from the tap," Mr Kingston said.
The bottled water ban would have no legislative force, instead relying on the town's shopkeepers maintaining a united position. People would be able to fill their own bottles for free from filtered water fountains to be installed on the main street and in the local public school.
The bottled water lobby's response was predictable claiming that "having bottled water on shop shelves gave people a healthier and equally convenient alternative to soft drinks".
"The suggestion that the general public is being conned by marketing is quite insulting, and as a member of the general public I take umbrage with that," said Geoff Parker, CEO of the Australasian Bottled Water Institute.
Here is something to ponder Mr Parker: Crude oil is brought from deep underground (at enormous cost), transported half way round the world, refined into petrol, transported again under stringent safety precautions, taxed at over 50%, sold at a profit and is still, at just over a dollar a litre, cheaper than any bottled water.
If that were not compelling enough NSW State Government research has shown that more than half the plastic water bottles sold are never used again, and end up in landfill sites or as litter.
By Nicholas Bernhardt
User comments
as long as government's continue pumping public water supplies full of chlorine there will be a demand for bottled water.
i agree that it's a marketers wet dream (apologies), however, there is also a valid case to be made for not drinking tap water when it contains a toxic poison that is almost impossible to improve
Anyone willing to pay three or four times the price of a litre of petrol for a litre of tap-water needs their head examined...
Every single council should follow this example. I am sick and tired of all the plastic bottle (and fast food wrapper) litter along the roadside.
Fantastic initiative - hope it catches. It really surprises me how gullible people in the developed world, paying 4 or 5 dollars for a litre of 'tap water'. Drinking bottled water in developing countries, on the other hand, does make sense.
Fantastic initiative by Bundanoon, the amount of plastic water bottles around is criminal. We really need to close this "market" off, we're so lucky to have easy access to clean water in this country. The worst of it is what we are doing to the ocean - the "Great Pacific Garbage Patch" is an area twice the size of Texas filled with plastic debris - much of it bottles. See wikipedia entry:
http://tinyurl.com/3cwca6
I agree with both Douglas and Melinda- I'd like to add that Australia is behind on this initiative. My mother visited me in Australia from Canada two years ago and couldn't believe the number of people she saw walking around with plastic water bottles. It's just not done there.
In Victoria, Australia, in the midst of our worst drought in a hundred years, Coca Cola-Amital has been paying a measly 5c a gigalitre for the water they resell at rip-off rates.
I refuse to support these corporate parasites.
If you have drinkable tap water it is almost scandalous not to use it. It's funny to see people complain about the price of petrol, while they happily pay far more for a bottle of water. I know which is easier to find, package and distribute...
