Access to fresh water and international trade law

Despite the year 2000 UN Millennium Development Goal 7 (target 3) to ‘halve, by 2015, the proportion of the population without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation', more than one billion people across the globe still suffer from a lack of access to fresh water. At least until the year 2050 the demand for fresh water on our planet will increase very rapidly due to accelerated population growth and industrial and agricultural development. On top of this comes the problem of climate change which, acting as an accelerator, is predicted to severely enhance already existing water access problems in some countries and contribute to causing such problems for others. While in the future some countries and regions will permanently dispose over abundant water resources, many others will be (and already are) confronted with severe water shortages. Therefore it is submitted that the inequality in the disposal over this most vital natural resource can be made up – at least to a certain extent – by means of trade in ‘fresh’ and ‘virtual’ (embedded in agricultural produce) water. Consequently, the main question before us will be how to efficiently organise future trade in water and the delivery of water services under WTO trade law, in order to help reaching MDG 7, target 3.