16 May 2007

Must be Something in the Water

The nexus between frogs and Coca Cola Amatil is not new, (check the Frog’s Head in in Diet Coke story) It highlights a fundamental conflict between the profit imperatives of a global corporation and local realities; social and ecological. This was most clearly seen in the well-publicised catastrophe in India.


For Gosford residents, the issue is given greater sharpness with the generous arrangements offered to Coca Cola Amatil to take water from the Mangrove Mountain aquifer at this time of water shortage and global warming.
With growing obesity, dental decay in children, etc., perhaps we need to take an inside look at the consequences of consuming beverages of this kind.
Today the Howard government refused the advice from health organizations to restrict TV junk food advertising screened in children’s viewing time. Why do they think these companies advertise if not to increase sales of junk food?
Of course at this time when water trading is being touted as a solution to government over-allocation of water licenses and over-consumption by Gosford and Wyong Councils, the fundamental question of how water became “privatised” is overlooked.

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