Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

A Coca-Cola plant in Mexico uses 1.08M liters of water per day as wells dry up

truth-out.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 162 posts

Re: A Coca-Cola plant in Mexico uses 1.08M liters of water per day as wells dry up

#31

Post by stun »

soneca wrote: post #18
grecy wrote: post #2

This exact situation in Venezuela made me think Hugo Chávez was not always completely nuts with some of his ideas. He was sick of multinationals like Coke buying water for a couple of cents a mega-liter. Coke would then add some sugar and color to it before selling it back to the people for dollars per liter. The expensive purification of that water was paid for by tax revenue. Chávez decided this was not right, and…

He identified a real problem (that part is not hard as no country is short of easily identifiable problems), the problem was he using it as base/narrative to gain more personal power and influence, instead of solving the problem for the country's benefit. The problem with third-world countries is not that the political elite fails to identify problems, it is that they use this to gain more power through populism or t…

Yeah populism in third world counties. What do you call whats happening in the US and Europe.

Re: A Coca-Cola plant in Mexico uses 1.08M liters of water per day as wells dry up

#32

Post by arkades »

microcolonel wrote: post #16
grecy wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you have ever been, you would see 99.9% of cruise passengers stay down the end of town designed for them, where the ships dock. Guess who owns the vast majority of shops there!...... Yup! Holland-America! (Friends tried to open a jewellery shop in Skagway, AK and didn't want to pay the kick-backs Holland-America demanded.... so Holland-America just warns people on the ships not to shop there .. "We heard someone g…

Not to play down the injustice, but it seems like you'd be able to prove a defamy case for the cost of one cruise. Alternately, you could prove a whole class of defamy cases if there are other businesses affected.

Defamation occurring and proving a case are notably different events, never mind the difficulties of proving damages (many businesses fold or make no profit in the first year even without defamation), and the cost of litigation.

Re: A Coca-Cola plant in Mexico uses 1.08M liters of water per day as wells dry up

#33

Post by pdog »

Water is a scarce resource.

A market system is the objectively the best mechanism for allocating scarce resources.

(Of course, if you object to a pure market system, the government can regulate the market and subsidize residential tap water.)

Why isn't water priced accordingly?

Re: A Coca-Cola plant in Mexico uses 1.08M liters of water per day as wells dry up

#34

Post by wyc »

> ...the company has permits for two wells to extract a total of 499,918 cubic meters of water per year, or 499.9 million liters. In 2016, the company extracted 78.8 percent of the permitted total.

So the government gave Coke the permits, Coke used under 80% of the agreed amount, and now it's a crisis? It has the markings of some severe utilities planning blunder.

> "The city has been growing significantly since the 1970s," he says in an interview at his office, which has a view of Huitepec mountain, where Coca-Cola extracts its water. "But in San Cristobal, there was no urban planning. And that's been aggravated by public policies that don't pay attention to the Indigenous people of the state."

That sort of gets at the real problem.

There are a lot of questions. Would things would actually get better if Coke were to shut down operations? How many people would stop drawing salaries? How much tax revenue loss does the government face with halted operations? Would the freed up water volume be enough to avert disaster? Does the drought affect everyday citizens or farmers the most? Are there any other environmental externalities that result from the Coke plant?

These are some of the tough questions that we need to answer before we can readily assign blame to megacorps. It's easy to hate large companies, and I dislike my fair share, but boiling this situation down into a headliner shaming corporate avarice may not be the best way to make progress. Maybe they should shut down the plant, or maybe they shouldn't--I don't know, and it shouldn't be for armchair economists thousands of miles away to decide. It just seems more complicated than the solicited visceral emotions may suggest.

Re: A Coca-Cola plant in Mexico uses 1.08M liters of water per day as wells dry up

#35

Post by notyourwork »

transverse wrote: post #12
grecy wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you have ever been, you would see 99.9% of cruise passengers stay down the end of town designed for them, where the ships dock. Guess who owns the vast majority of shops there!...... Yup! Holland-America! (Friends tried to open a jewellery shop in Skagway, AK and didn't want to pay the kick-backs Holland-America demanded.... so Holland-America just warns people on the ships not to shop there .. "We heard someone g…

I spent on a tour, a ride, and on beer, easily a hundred in all. There are many ways to spend.

I spend easily a hundred on dinner for my family in one sitting. That doesn't mean it props up the economy where I live nor is it a way to justify an argument about an entire economy in a city you visited once.

Re: A Coca-Cola plant in Mexico uses 1.08M liters of water per day as wells dry up

#36

Post by simion314 »

microcolonel wrote: post #16
grecy wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you have ever been, you would see 99.9% of cruise passengers stay down the end of town designed for them, where the ships dock. Guess who owns the vast majority of shops there!...... Yup! Holland-America! (Friends tried to open a jewellery shop in Skagway, AK and didn't want to pay the kick-backs Holland-America demanded.... so Holland-America just warns people on the ships not to shop there .. "We heard someone g…

Not to play down the injustice, but it seems like you'd be able to prove a defamy case for the cost of one cruise. Alternately, you could prove a whole class of defamy cases if there are other businesses affected.

This would work if you would have tons of money, I am looking at Intel case where the evidence is clear and the process is taking years,then someone appeals, some minor issue is found and everything needs to start over, it is hard to fight against a big corporation.

Re: A Coca-Cola plant in Mexico uses 1.08M liters of water per day as wells dry up

#37

Post by stun »

ams6110 wrote: post #24
grecy wrote: post #2

This exact situation in Venezuela made me think Hugo Chávez was not always completely nuts with some of his ideas. He was sick of multinationals like Coke buying water for a couple of cents a mega-liter. Coke would then add some sugar and color to it before selling it back to the people for dollars per liter. The expensive purification of that water was paid for by tax revenue. Chávez decided this was not right, and…

I really don't think you can put Hugh Chávez into any argument about making the world a better place. Venezuela is a disaster, and the human suffering is inexcusable.

Yeah its Chavez's fault. No mention of sanctions, sanctions. The people who are obsessed with sanctions don't care about the humantarian impact as long as they get what they want.

Re: A Coca-Cola plant in Mexico uses 1.08M liters of water per day as wells dry up

#38

Post by pgt »

mad_tortoise wrote: post #3

So where I'm from we have a similar problem yet no end in site. After last years summer we had one of the worst droughts this region has ever had, but then it went into winter. It didn't rain much this winter and now we're back in summer... With water restrictions starting the summer as bad as they were when we ended it. To the point of this though. One of the worlds largest breweries is situated in my city. My count…

As a Cape Town resident, I can corroborate all of the above. The city has instituted "Level 5B" water restrictions which mean <87L/person/day and no irrigation or washing allowed using municipal water.

Re: A Coca-Cola plant in Mexico uses 1.08M liters of water per day as wells dry up

#39

Post by 3pt14159 »

Water is a tricky thing. Take almonds for example. One almond takes about 4 liters of water to produce. With 1.6 billion pounds of almonds grown per year we're looking at almost 2.5 trillion liters of water. This is just one nut. Pistachios and walnuts use similar amounts of water, so do other things we eat like broccoli.

I blame Coca-Cola and their ilk for the obesity epidemic, but water shortages are more caused by farming and climate change than they are by breweries or bottling plants.

Re: A Coca-Cola plant in Mexico uses 1.08M liters of water per day as wells dry up

#40

Post by bpicolo »

3pt14159 wrote: post #39

Water is a tricky thing. Take almonds for example. One almond takes about 4 liters of water to produce. With 1.6 billion pounds of almonds grown per year we're looking at almost 2.5 trillion liters of water. This is just one nut. Pistachios and walnuts use similar amounts of water, so do other things we eat like broccoli. I blame Coca-Cola and their ilk for the obesity epidemic, but water shortages are more caused by…

> One almond takes about 4 liters of water to produce

How long does it take for that water to re-enter the ecosystem in a usable way? Water isn't just destroyed, yeah?

Water planning is definitely worthwhile, but seems there are a few other variables in play.

Post reply on HN