Editor,
This letter is in response to John B. Challinor II (director of corporate affairs, Nestlé Waters Canada) "Bottle water info wrong" letter, published in the Sept. 24 issue of The Chief.
First off I would like to commend the District of Squamish's move to ban bottled water in municipal facilities, and extend accolades to staff technician Brooke Carere for leading this effort.
The facts of the original article may be debatable depending on whose statistics you read. It would seem obvious that Mr. Challinor, representing Nestle, a party who directly profits from the sale of bottled water needs to make his industry look good.
Facts, stats, and profit aside, at a fundamental level bottled water supports the privatization of a natural resource that we simply cannot live without. When we buy bottled water we use our dollars to support private industry.
If we can access clean water through private industry, there is less public concern placed on the integrity of our tap water, and preservation of our watershed. This opens opportunity for a two tier water system in North America that delivers clean water to those who can afford.
This two tier water system is thriving in non-industrialized countries, and Nestle, the world market leader in bottled water is setting tone here by selling it's "pure life" product (which happens to be purified tap water with added minerals) in countries like Pakistan, Brazil, China, Vietnam, Thailand, and Mexico where clean tap water is very limited. Sure Nestle may be working to reduce the amount of plastics in our landfill, as cited by Mr. Challinor, but if we weren't drinking bottled water then we wouldn't need to reduce plastics, because we wouldn't even be using them.
Clean fresh water is a very precious resource that needs to be treated with the upmost respect and when it comes down to it we can't drink money. I look forward to seeing and hearing how the district, in partnership with volunteers at the Climate Action Network, will continue to instil municipal confidence in our drinking water through this "take back the tap" campaign - keep up the great work.
Kimberley Armour
Squamish
