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DAM-L LS: BBC, Wire Stories on the WCD Launch (fwd)
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subject: LS: BBC, Wire Stories on the WCD Launch
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Following are some stories on the release of the World Commission on Dams
report yesterday in London. Coverage has been excellent.
1) Dams are damned in new report (audio), BBC News, November 16, 2000
2) Human cost of dams 'too high', BBC News, November 16, 2000
3) Narmada: A history of controversy, BBC News, November 16, 2000
4) Report criticises dams for human, environmental cost, Reuters, 11/16/00
5) Report Criticizes World's Dams, Associated Press, 11/16/00
------------------------------------
Dams are damned in new report
BBC News
Thursday, 16 November, 2000
------------------------------------
Dams are damned in new report
The World Commision on Dams has
issued a long-awaited report criticising
dams for wreaking ecological havoc,
driving millions of local people from their
homes and failing to deliver promised
prosperity. So why are dams the highest
expenditure item in aid budgets
worldwide?
Click here for an interview with Dai Qing (3 Gorges), Kua Kia Soong (Bakun)
and Jeremy Bird (WCD)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/asiapacific/eastasiatoday/ram/eat1.ram
------------------------------------
Human cost of dams 'too high'
BBC News
16 November, 2000, 13:12 GMT
------------------------------------
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/newsid_1026000/1026052.stm
By environment correspondent Alex Kirby
[Picture shows graffiti on wall - "Maheshwar Dam is a Curse to Humanity]
Dams arouse strong passions, as here in India
An international group of experts says dams worldwide have provided many
benefits, but often at too high a price.
The experts, members of the World Commission on Dams (WCD), say decisions
on whether to build the structures should respect the interests of everyone
concerned.
They say dams account for more than 10% of global food production and
almost 20% of electricity generation.
But the people affected by them have little say in their planning and
building.
Conflicting interests
The WCD was set up by the World Bank and the World Conservation Union. It
is chaired by Professor Kader Asmal, South Africa's Education Minister.
It has tried to find a way through "the increasingly confrontational debate
about the role the 45,000 large dams have played in development". Large
dams are those over 15 meters high.
Professor Asmal said: "It means nothing to build billion-dollar dams if
your monuments alienate the weak.
"It means nothing to stop all dams if your protests only entrench poverty.
Threatened with arrest
"But show me a clear and sustainable way to provide food, energy, stability
and running water for those who most need it - that means something. And
that we have done."
The award-winning novelist Arundhati Roy opposes the building of the
Narmada dam in India.
She told BBC News Online: "There are a lot of very important things in the
WCD report, though it's obviously a compromise.
"The problem is that it can be used by the funding agencies to pretend they
have an enlightened approach, while the reality remains completely different.
"The industry is learning our language and then carrying on just the same.
"And when the WCD members wanted to come to India to see the Narmada site,
the Gujarat Government threatened to arrest them."
Inclusive approach
The commission's members surveyed 125 large dams, eight of them in detail.
It found that:
* globally, dams account for 19% of electricity generated and for an
estimated 12-16% of global food production
* many fall short of their physical and economic targets
* they have led to the loss of forests, wildlife habitat, and aquatic
biodiversity. Efforts to counter their impact have met with limited success
* estimates suggest that some 40-80m people have been displaced by dams
worldwide, yet mitigation, compensation and resettlement attempts are often
inadequate.
It is almost always the most marginal members of society who are harmed by
dams.
"Little or no meaningful participation of affected people in the planning
and implementation of dam projects has taken place", the commission says.
Other methods available
"The direct adverse impacts of dams have fallen disproportionately on rural
dwellers, subsistence farmers, indigenous peoples, ethnic minorities, and
women."
The WCD says there is far greater scope for using alternative ways of
meeting people's needs, including renewable energy, recycling, better
irrigation, and reducing water losses.
It is concerned about the loss of cultural heritage involved, and
criticises the environmental performance of large dams.
It says rotting vegetation trapped underwater releases carbon dioxide and
methane, both potent greenhouse gases, and that this can cause more
pollution than generating electricity by burning fossil fuels.
Professor Asmal told the launch of the WCD report: "We reviewed
alternatives. We balanced ideal against possible, and made our decision to
sign this report with confidence.
Reparations demand
"We exclude only one development option: inaction. The cost of conflict is
too high."
Patrick McCully, of the International Rivers Network, which works to link
human rights and environmental protection, told BBC News Online: "The WCD
largely vindicates what critics have been saying for years.
"It recognises the legitimacy of claims for reparations, and we want a
moratorium on all large dams until those reparations are paid and the
commission's recommendations implemented.
"And we want a halt to work on all dams under construction until they've
been properly reviewed."
------------------------------------------------
Narmada: A history of controversy
BBC News
16 November, 2000, 13:37 GMT
------------------------------------------------
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/south_asia/newsid_1026000/1026355.stm
India's most controversial dam project, the Narmada project, was first
envisaged in 1940s by the country's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru.
The dam was part of a vision of development articulated by Mr Nehru.
But several legal and logistical arguments between various Indian states
delayed the announcement of the project until 1979.
The multi-million dollar project involves the construction of some 3,200
small, medium and large dams on the Narmada river.
The Narmada originates in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh and
empties into the Arabian sea after flowing through Maharashtra and Gujarat
states.
The Sardar Sarovar is the biggest dam on the river and its construction has
been fiercely opposed.
Controversy
The Narmada Bachao Andolan (Save the Narmada Movement), which is
spearheading the protest, says the project will displace more than 200,000
people apart from damaging the fragile ecology of the region.
[graphic - Farmland will be submerged once the dam is complete]
NBA activists say the dams will submerge forest farmland, disrupt
downstream fisheries and possibly inundate and salinate land along the
canals, increasing the prospect of insect-borne diseases.
Some scientists have added to the debate saying the construction of large
dams could cause earthquakes.
They say that in a country as disorganised as India, it is likely that the
necessary maintenance of these dams may suffer.
But those in favour of the project say that the project will supply water
to 30m people and irrigate crops to feed another 20m people.
In what was seen as a major victory for the anti-dam activists, the World
Bank withdrew from the Narmada project in 1993.
A massive undertaking
Several other international financial institutions also pulled out citing
human and environmental concerns.
The construction of Sardar Sarovar dam itself was stopped soon afterwards.
Go ahead
However, in October 2000, the Indian Supreme Court gave a go-ahead for the
construction of the dam.
The court ruled that the height of the dam could be raised to 90 metres and
no higher, until cleared by an environmental authority appointed to
undertake the task.
This is far below the proposed height of 130 metres, but higher than the 88
metres that the anti-dam activists want.
So as the anti-dam activists ponder their next move, the government has
started again with construction of the Sardar Sarovar dam.
NARMADA FACTS
Project began in 1979
3,200 dams to be built along 1,200km Narmada river
Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Rajasthan likely to benefit
Opponents says it will displace 200,000 people and damage ecology
World Bank withdrew in 1993
To be fully complete by 2025
------------------------------------
Report criticises dams for human, environmental cost
Reuters - Patricia Reaney
11/16/00
------------------------------------
http://www.reuters.com/news_article.jhtml?type=world&Repository=WORLD_REP&RepositoryStoryID=%2Fnews%2FIDS%2FWorld%2FOUKWD-ENVIRONMENT-DAMS_NEW.XML
LONDON (Reuters) - Dams have delivered major benefits to more than 140
countries but have exacted a high price in human hardship and environmental
damage, experts said on Thursday.
A new report by the World Commission on Dams, an independent body sponsored
by the World Bank and the World Conservation Union (IUCN), calls for a new
approach to planning and building dams that takes into account the needs
and desires of people.
"This report provides answers and solutions," former South African
president Nelson Mandela, invited to unveil the document, said at the
launch in London.
At 400 pages and two years in the making, the report is the first
independent, systematic assessment of large dams around the world.
While extolling their power, water and farming benefits, the report
concludes that in many cases fewer people might have been displaced, more
livelihoods salvaged and the loss of fish and birds might have been avoided
if large dams had been better planned.
"The report is vigorous without being rigorous," Kader Asmal, the chairman
of the commission, told a news conference.
"It shows how nations can make the best development decisions every time."
Achim Steiner, the secretary general of the World Commission on Dams (WCD),
said the most fundamental negative finding was the systematic failure to
account fully for the social impact dams have had on communities they
displaced and on those downstream from them.
"We estimate there are about 40-80 million people that have been displaced
by dams. You are talking about a very significant number of people,"
Steiner said in an interview.
The 12-member commission which includes representatives from industry, dam
owners, governments and environmentalists, also found that many dams are
run inefficiently, involve cost overruns and have led to accidents and the
loss of flood plains, forests, fisheries and wildlife.
The commission recommends that large dam projects should only be approved
if they meet a framework and guidelines, set out in the report, that
recognise the rights of and assess the risks to all interested parties.
The World Bank welcomed the report and said it firmly believes in the
process of reaching out and encouraging dialogue.
"Dams offer huge benefits but sometimes at a large cost. The Bank is
currently funding less than one percent of dam projects worldwide within
strict environmental and social guidelines," World Bank President James
Wolfensohn said in a statement.
ACTIVISTS SEIZE ON REPORT
Critics of dams immediately seized on the report as a vindication. They
challenged the funders of the $42 billion per year dam industry, including
the World Bank and export credit agencies, to stop supporting all dam
projects unless they meet the report's criteria. They also called for
compensation for the social and environmental damage caused by dams.
"Had the planning process proposed by the WCD been followed in the past,
many dams would not have been built," Patrick McCully of the
California-based International Rivers Network said in a statement.
The report could influence the future of China's Three Gorges dam, the dams
on India's Narmada river, the Ilisu dam in Turkey, San Roque in the
Philippines, Bujagali in Uganda and Ralco in Chile among others.
Asmal said the report drew no unilateral conclusions, adding that
governments must decide what reviews should take place.
The report said China and India had half the world's 45,000 dams. Dams
account for 19 percent of electricity generated worldwide, and 24 countries
generate more than 90 percent of their power from dams.
------------------------------------
Report Criticizes World's Dams
By Ian Phillips
Associated Press Writer
Thursday, Nov. 16, 2000; 2:14 p.m. EST
------------------------------------
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/aponline/20001116/aponline141415_000.htm
LONDON -- Tens of millions of people displaced. Livelihoods wrecked.
Fragile ecosystems destroyed. Animal species made extinct.
Large dams have brought much-needed power and water to the world, but their
toll on the environment has been unacceptable, according to a report
released Thursday by the World Commission on Dams. The report proposed
strict new guidelines for future projects.
After two years of research focused mainly on nine major dams - including
Grand Coulee in Washington state - the commission said previous evaluations
of the possible damaging side effects of dams were "few in number, narrow
in scope ... and inadequately linked to decisions on operations."
Among its findings: 40-80 million people displaced worldwide and rarely
compensated by governments; an irreversible loss of fish and aquatic
species; and huge losses of forests and wetlands.
In a speech to environmentalists in London to mark the report's release,
Former South African President Nelson Mandela said Thursday that he wished
the findings had been available when he sanctioned the construction of some
of his country's 539 dams.
"There is a part of me that resented having to choose the lesser of two
evils - relocate some so that all may have water, or forgo a dam, thus
slowing human development," he said.
The 12-member commission was set up in 1998 by the World Bank and World
Conservation Union.
The body, which includes representatives from industry, dam owners,
governments and environmentalists, called for dam projects to sustain
rivers and livelihoods and for greater efficiency and accountability.
It also said alternative methods should be studied, that more effort was
needed to gain public approval, and that in-depth environmental impact
studies should be mandatory.
It proposed reviews of all existing large dams.
James Wolfensohn, president of the World Bank, which in recent years has
markedly scaled back its financing of dams, said he would present the
findings to the bank's 180 member nations. A decision on whether to
implement the guidelines when financing future projects is expected in
February.
"This report gives us a basis upon which we can move toward trying to deal
with the healing of the wounds," Wolfensohn said.
Half the world's dams were built for irrigation purposes and account for 12
to 16 percent of the world's food production, while others act as flood
defenses and to produce hydropower and water supply.
Dams account for 19 percent of electricity generated worldwide, and 24
countries generate more than 90 percent of their power from dams.
More than 100 non-governmental organizations called Thursday for a
suspension of all dam projects until they are reviewed in accordance with
the committee's report.
"If the builders and funders of dams follow the recommendations ... the era
of destructive dams should come to an end," said Patrick McCully of the
California-based International Rivers Network.
There are 45,000 large dams in the world, most built in the 1970s, when an
average of two to three new large projects were commissioned each day to
help meet escalating demands for water. China and India have half the
world's dams.
Construction has tailed off in recent years, but projects such as the
Sardar Sarovar Dam across India's Narmada River are still a source of
controversy. India's Supreme Court recently gave the go-ahead for work to
continue, dismissing widespread concerns the dam will flood villages and
displace hundreds of thousands of people.
In China, 10,000 villagers were recently moved away from the massive Three
Gorges Dam - a figure expected to climb to more than 1 million.
The best documented examples of disrupted fish migrations are from the
Columbia River in Washington state, where an estimated 5-14 percent of the
adult salmon population are killed "at each of the eight large dams they
pass while swimming up the river," the commission said.
In addition to Grand Coulee, the other dams studied by the committee were
Pak Mun in Thailand, Aslantas in Turkey, Glomma-Laagen Basin in Norway,
Kariba in Zambia and Zimbabwe, Tarbela in Pakistan, Tucurui in Brazil, and
Gariep and Vanderkloof in South Africa.
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