What those fertilisers cannot replace, however, are the other trace elements in the silt and the organic matter it contains; nor, more important still, can they replace the soil being lost to the more intensive agricultural practices rendered possible by perennial irrigation. Indeed, in 1974, Sayyid Marei, Minister of Agriculture since 1952 and Chairman of the 1974 World Food Conference, was to tell a parliamentary committee: “I say in all candour, as loudly as possible, I am worried, extremely worried, because of the threat to the fertility of our soils.” [24]
One aspect of the problem which particularly alarmed Marei was the lack of drainage at sites where land had been reclaimed. Marei himself maintains that he warned his colleagues that the only possible result of reclamation without drainage would be increased salinisation but, he claims, his warnings went unheeded.
What is certain, however, is that those reclamation schemes which lacked drainage proved disastrous for Egypt. Thus, a recent FAO study found that over a third of Egypt’s agricultural land is now afflicted with salinity whilst some 90 percent of cultivated land has problems with waterlogging. Hardly surprising, perhaps, for in 1975 less than 3 million feddans had any drainage of any kind.
That the Egyptian government was able to ignore the advice of one of its most prominent politicians is testament enough to its capacity for self-deception. Just as it did not wish to hear about the problems of soil fertility, evaporation, riverbed scouring or seepage, so it was quite unwilling to listen to talk of waterlogging and salinisation. Small wonder, then, that Waterbury ends his study of the hydropolitics of the Nile Valley with the following observation:
“The political decision (to build a dam) frequently embodies a symbolic package that is designed to catch people’s imagination at home and abroad, to arouse the populace, to set collective goals and thus to find in motivational terms a substitute for war. This is an atmosphere fundamentally inhospitable to the niggling of conscientious technocrats who may be seen as front-men, witting or unwitting for the regime’s enemies. Their sincerity will be in question.
This has been the case in Egypt, where the sense of national cohesion and even consensus about national goals and leadership is far more pronounced than in many, if not most, Third World countries. But who would publicly stand up today to question the wisdom of sowing the desert with new cities or trying to make the Sinai green and populous?” [25]
It is a good question for, as we shall see in the next section, the political motives which led to the building of Aswan – are symptomatic of most dam building projects.
Power-broking, pork barrel and corruption
From the Aswan example, we may draw out three general factors that dominated the dam’s history. First, the political and psychological fears that were the initial spur to seeking over-year storage in Egypt itself. Second, the messianic fervour which infected both the Nasser regime and the general public. And, third, the unwillingness to contemplate criticism.
Although the details are specific to Aswan, those three features are common to many other dams around the world. The messianic element, for instance, is clearly evident in the James Bay project, launched under the slogan ‘The World Begins Tomorrow’. So too, President Nkrumah of Ghana promised that the Volta Dam would rescue the Ghana-nians from being “hewers of wood and drawers of water for the West” and lead them instead into a new industrial age where “economic modernisation relieves the working man . . . of some of the less necessary forms of drudgery.” [26]
If millenarism is a constant feature of many large-scale dam projects, the political motives which influence their construction can be many and varied. In some cases, however, they are starkly obvious. One reason why the Guyanese government was so keen to promote the Upper Mazaruni Dam lay in a complex border dispute between Guyana and Venezuela which centred on the Mazaruni Basin. In 1970, a moratorium was signed in which it was agreed that neither party in the dispute would take unilateral action to strengthen its claim. Thus, it is suggested, by developing the area, Guyana hoped to establish a presence strong enough to undermine Venezuela’s position in any future negotiations. [27]
There is little doubt, too, that the primary motive for the Sudanese government’s plans to push ahead with the building of the Jonglei Canal after the ending of the civil war in the Southern Sudan lay in the desire to consolidate its victory and complete the integration of the North and South. Indeed, the Commissioner for the project was quite specific as to the canal’s political advantages:
“Historically, the rift between North and South has increased in the past because of the lack of communications. The Sudd has always been a barrier. And that is why the Sudanese in the northern part tend towards the Middle East rather than Africa. Our link with Africa and with the South in particular was weakened because of the difficulty of communication.” [28]
But, whilst the Commissioner saw the Jonglei Canal as an instrument of reconciliation, others were less sanguine. Indeed, rumours that the area would be colonised by Northerners (and particularly Egyptians) led to riots in 1974.
So too, it is difficult to explain the inordinately long transmission lines which are being built to supply Zaire’s Shaba mines with electricity in anything other than political terms. At present, the mines are run on electricity imported from neighbouring Zambia. Plans are afoot, however, to supply power from dams on the Zaire-Congo river, some 1,700 km away. Once the necessary transmission line is completed, the government’s control over the rich and independently-minded Shaba province will be considerably increased. As Warren Linney and Susan Harrison point out: “If Shaba tries for independence, the electricity can be cut off.” [29]
Such overt politicking is by no means confined to developing countries. In the industrialised world, too, political considerations provide the rationale for many dams. For the most part, those considerations are eminently parochial. Put simply: dam projects win votes. To begin with, any new project automatically thrusts the sitting member of Congress or parliament into the limelight. As George Pring, then a researcher at the Washington-based Environmental Defence Fund, points out:
“The average congressman can re-dedicate the same dam for four or five consecutive elections. First, he dedicates the ground breaking. Then he dedicates the land purchases. Then he comes back and dedicates the flood abutments. And then he dedicates the flagpoles. A congressman’s future in many parts of the country, as the saying goes, is written in concrete.” [30]
Perhaps more important still, opposition to a dam upsets what has become known in America as the ‘pork barrel’. The term is reputedly derived from the custom amongst slavers of occasionally providing their slaves with a barrel of preserved pork; on such occasions, those with the longest reach and the most determined disposition inevitably had the most to eat. The handing out of choice federal contracts is now seen by many to be run on the same principles. As George Laycock, author of The Diligent Destroyers, comments:
“The pork barrel has become a way of political life. Politicians . . . often believe they can equate their worth to their home districts with the amount of money they send back from the federal treasury. Although there are other cuts of pork, such as post office buildings, the choice ones are the impressive big water projects scattered from Maine to Hawaii. The individual congressman has his eye on the project closest to his heart, which is to say, nearest to his voting booth. He might sense that projects within the bill are a waste of federal funds, but he is reluctant to argue against his fellow-congressmen’s favourite dam or canal. To do so is to jeopardize the other’s support for his own pet project.” [31]
The key to understanding why the pork barrel system still holds sway – and, indeed, why it is so carefully nurtured by the politicians themselves – lies in the nature of the bits of ‘pork’ being doled out. In effect, they are free gifts from the federal government – vast sums of money which promise to generate localised economic growth:
- for farmers, the prospect is of cheap supplies of water;
- for local estate agents, there is the vision of new housing developments;
- whilst for the unemployed there is the possibility of new jobs.
That those benefits are often not forthcoming is irrelevant: what is important is that each new project brings with it the promise of an economic bonanza. Small wonder, then, that politicians are so eager to bring home their bits of ‘pork’.
The horse-trading that goes with pork-barrel politics – and the influence it brings – inevitably breeds corruption. By its very nature, that corruption is hard to document: nonetheless, informed sources confirm that it is widespread. Indeed, we may assume with confidence that support for numerous water projects the world over has only been won by the lure of a numbered (and bankable) Swiss bank account.
In that respect, it is worth noting a remark made by Representative Michael Meyers, one of those US congressmen involved in the so-called Abscam scandal. In conversation with a group of businessmen whom he assumed to be representatives of an interested foreign power (but who were, in fact, FBI undercover agents) Meyers was asked about his influence with the State Department. Though poorly expressed, his reply (taped by the FBI) was explicit enough:
“There’s a million deals. It’s a trading game down in Washington . . . Going onto the Appropriations Committee in January, this makes me a very important guy.” [32]
In particular, Meyers mentioned that some congressional committees “who have key members who are involved in State are interested in something from the Appropriations Committee, where they need funding for a dam.” The implication is clear: if Meyers played the game, he could win the necessary influence at the State Department.
The extent to which the US Congress is beset by such corruption is hard to gauge. Direct bribery is probably the exception: more typically, agribusiness, engineering consultants and construction unions have made ‘campaign contributions’ to Congressmen seeking re-election, thereby hoping to secure a dam project.
In the Third World, bribery and corruption are openly acknowledged to be part and parcel of most industrial contracts – including water projects. One informed source who has had dealings with certain West African governments, reports that in order to even see a minister, it is necessary to deposit a briefcase full of money with the appropriate secretary. Only then will an appointment be arranged. Meanwhile, in Sri Lanka, another source reports that one third of the aid money intended for the Mahaweli scheme has gone in bribes.
It need hardly be said, however, that institutionalised corruption – whether in the form of bribery or pork-barrel politics – makes for poor decisions. Take, for example, the plans to bring water to the Western and South Western United States. The massive demand for water in the area has already led to a precipitous fall in groundwater reserves, to rivers running dry and to widespread salinisation. According to David Sheridan:
“Present rates of irrigation in some parts of south-western Nebraska will cause water level declines of almost 50 percent between 1978 and the year 2000. In Nebraska, an average of over 300,000 acres of irrigated corn (for grain) has been established each year since 1973. Half of all the existing irrigation projects in the western part of the state are expected to experience water shortages in 20-25 years.” [33]
Indeed, Sheridan argues that in many areas of the arid Western United States, “human systems are exceeding the carrying capacity of their natural life support systems.” Nonetheless, it is unlikely that any sensible conservation measures will be introduced voluntarily. The reason lies in the availability of federal pork. No-one, least of all the farmers in the area, want to be told that they must limit their use of water: instead, they see the solution lying in the massive water projects which the politicians promise to build with federal funds. Sheridan cites the city of Tucson’s response to its dwindling groundwater supply as typical of the problem. Thus, he writes:
Back to top“Limiting water consumption . . . would seem to be the logical solution, but it apparently has not been politically feasible. Many of the people who have moved to this desert oasis from parts of the country with much wetter climates and have brought with them water consuming habits such as lawn watering that are ill-suited to the desert. More importantly, to limit water use is to limit economic growth, and many vested interests in the area – developers, construction companies, financial institutions – have a big stake in continued economic growth. So, instead of conserving water or doing without more water, cities such as Tucson look to the federal government to provide inexpensive water.” [34]
States within States
If the eagerness of politicians to bring home the pork is one side of the dam-building coin, the power of those institutions which build and plan dams and other water projects is the other. Handling vast budgets, and enjoying considerable political power themselves, they are well-versed in the art of lobbying.
For example, George Laycock recalls how one civil servant, working for the US Corps of Engineers, went about ‘handling’ a congressman he wished to interest in a project. The civil servant told a biologist from the US Fish and Wildlife Service:
“We maintain dossiers on each member of the Appropriations Committee. When one of these congressmen came to New Orleans recently, we were ready for him. One of our people took a friend of his to dinner in Washington just to learn more about him. We found out that he was a diabetic. So, when he arrived in New Orleans, his air-conditioned limousine was already equipped with a refrigerator stocked with everything he might need, including insulin.” [35]
Whatever the means used to obtain its influence in Congress, the US Corps of Engineers – together with the Bureau of Reclamation – undoubtedly wields considerable political power on Capitol Hill. When, in 1979, President Carter tried to put through a bill which would have created a new department, the Department of Natural Resources, and made it responsible for reviewing water projects, his efforts were stymied by the Corps and its allied agencies. Later, in 1980, Carter was forced to lift his presidential veto on a proposed bill which would have sanctioned $4.2 billion worth of water projects – a bill he had previously called “a travesty, wasteful, destructive and expensive”. [36]
Elsewhere we find agencies which are equally powerful. Thus, Tasmania’s Hydro-Electric Commission (HEC) has been accused of being a ‘state within a state’. Peter Thompson of the Australian Conservation Foundation writes,
“For more than fifty years the Commission has played a virtually unchallenged role as Tasmania’s economic, social and land-use planner. It has been an organisation operating in a power vacuum, created by a succession of parliaments which have never insisted on the public accountability of the HEC.” [37] [For a full account of the politics of dam-building in Tasmania, see the papers by Thompson and by Crabbe in Volume II: Case Studies.]
Thompson is not alone in expressing that view of the Commission. Other, more official, bodies have also voiced growing concern at the power now enjoyed by the HEC. Thus, in 1980, Tasmania’s own Directorate of Energy noted with alarm that the Commission was sounding out potential customers for its hydro-electric power without referring to other government departments.
“It would seem that the Hydro-Electric Commission has been permitted, in the absence of adequate policy guidance, to act as a de facto, and largely autonomous, economic planning agency. This is indisputably not its role.”
Earlier, in 1974, a committee of inquiry into the HEC’s plans to flood Tasmania’s Lake Pedder expressed harsh criticisms of “the limited scope of the Commission’s planning objectives and evaluation criteria . . . and the narrow scope of the Commission’s professional expertise.” Indeed, the Committee of Inquiry argued:
“It appears to be a close knit and tightly disciplined organisation and might be considered the archetype of the kind of government instrumentality described as a ‘guild authority’ by John Power of the Canberra CAE. Such organisations arc common amongst public works agencies in Australia, particularly in the water resources field. They tend to internalise expertise to avoid independent review of their proposals, to discourage public knowledge of their activities, and to have limited (generally single purpose) objectives.
Because of their staffing structure and the nature of their charter, such organisations are ill equipped to handle problems which involve multi-objective planning environmental considerations or inter disciplinary co-operation. (Some organisations react) by drawing within themselves and refusing to acknowledge that problems outside their own field or expertise exist. The Hydro-Electric Commission was one such organisation in 1967. The experience of this Committee suggests that it is still very much so.” [38]
That view of the commission has been amply born out in the 10 years since the Committee of Inquiry sat. Indeed, nothing could better illustrate the HEC’s tunnel vision and unwillingness to accept criticism than its reaction to the international outcry over its plans to dam the Franklin River. It was not until the High Court of Australia ruled that the area (which had been included in the World Heritage List as an area of outstanding natural beauty) should be preserved that the HEC agreed to halt work on the dam.
Such outright disregard for international opinion is exceptional. Nevertheless, the determination shown by the HEC to build the Franklin River Dam is symptomatic of a more general tendency within the industry to push ahead with projects apparently regardless of the case against them. Indeed, the record makes it quite apparent that figures have frequently been falsified in order to win approval for projects which – on the basis of any objective analysis – would never be sanctioned, let alone constructed. In the next chapter, we shall consider that allegation in more detail.
« previous chapter · contents · next chapter »
References
1. E. Barton Worthington, ‘The Nile Catchment – Technological Change and Aquatic Biology’, in M. T. Farvar and J. P. Milton (Eds), The Careless Technology, Tom Stacey, London 1973. In the same paper, Worthington remarks: “Every project in Nile control has had to be undertaken with a strictly limited background of knowledge. As a scientist who has participated in development, I have sometimes found it positively frightening to make decisions which will affect the lives of millions of people when the basic facts were unknown. It felt a bit like writing the conclusions of a scientific paper before settling down to do the research.” p.204.
2. Aloys Michel, ‘The Impact of Modern Irrigation Technology in the Indus and Helmand Basins of Southwest Asia’, in M. T. Farvar and J. P. Milton (Eds), The Careless Technology, Tom Stacey, London, 1973, p.265.
3. Ibid, p.273.
4. John Waterbury, The Hydropolitics of the Nile Valley, Syracuse University Press, 1979, p.4.
5. Ibid, p.243.
6. Ibid, p.247.
7. Ali Fathy, The High Dam and its Impact, General Book, Cairo, 1976, pp.50-51. Quoted by John Waterbury, Hydropolitics of the Nile Valley, Syracuse University Press, 1979, p.116.
8. Quoted by John Waterbury, Hydropolitics of the Nile Valley, Syracuse University Press, 1979, p.101.
9. Mackenzie Wallace, Egypt and the Egyptian Question, Macmillan, London, 1883, pp.15, 250. Quoted by John Waterbury, Hydropolitics of the Nile Valley, Syracuse University Press, 1979, p.35.
10. John Waterbury, Hydropolitics of the Nile Valley, Syracuse University Press, 1979, p.39.
11. Ibid, pp.40-41.
12. Such fears were not new. Indeed, they date back to an unsuccessful attempt by the French in 1898 to establish a military presence at the head of the Nile. Since then, the British had shown themselves fully aware of the power they held by controlling the major upstream states. Thus, in response to the murder of Sir Lee Stack, commander of the Anglo-Egyptian armies in 1924, Lord Allenby had announced that the size of the Sudan’s Gezira cotton scheme would immediately be increased from 300,000 feddans to “an unlimited figure as need may arise”. Although Allenby assured the Pasha of Egypt that Britain had “no intention of trespassing upon the natural and historic rights of Egypt in the waters of the Nile”, the threat had been clear enough: if Egypt did not control its nationalists, then Britain would interfere with its water supplies.
13. J. Waterbury, op.cit. 1979, p.63.
14. Ibid, p.78. Sadat was responding to news that Cuban troops were present in Ethiopia: how much more threatened must Nasser have felt when his fledgling regime first confronted Britain in the 1950s.
15. Ibid, p.99.
16. Ibid, p.108.
17. Ibid, p.116.
18. Gamal Abd Al-Nasser, Speech at first closure of the Nile at the High Dam site, 14 May 1964. Quoted by J. Waterbury, op.cit. 1979, p.98.
19. J. Waterbury, op.cit. 1979, p.117.
20. Ibid, p.122.
21. Ibid, p.l25.
22. William Willcocks, The Nile in 1904, London, 1904. Quoted by John Waterbury, op.cit. 1979, p.39.
23. J. Waterbury, op.cit. 1979, p.130 (footnote).
24. Ibid, p.129.
25. Ibid, p.247.
26. Quoted in Rob Pardy et. al. Purari: Overpowering PNG? International Development Action for Purari Action Group, p.136.
27. See: Gordon Bennet et. al. The Damned: The Plight of the Akawaio Indians of Guyana, Survival International Document VI, London, 1978.
28. Quoted in Earthscan, The Jonglei Canal, Press Briefing Document No. 8, London, p.28.
29. W. Linney and S. Harrison, Large Dams and the Developing World: Social and Environmental Costs and Benefits – A Look at Africa, Environment Liaison Centre, P.O.Box 72461, Nairobi, 1981, p.31.
30. Quoted by F. Powledge, Water: The Nature, Uses and Future of our Most Precious and Abused Resource, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York, 1982, p.288.
31. George Laycock, The Diligent Destroyers, Audubon / Ballantine, 1970, p.30.
32. Quoted in F. Powledge, Water: The Nature, Uses and Future of our Most Precious and Abused Resource, Farrar, Straus, Giroux, New York, 1982, p.286.
33. David Sheridan, ‘The Underwatered West: Overdrawn at the Well’, Environment, Vol. 23 No. 2, March 1981, p.9.
34. Ibid, p.31.
35. George Laycock, op.cit. 1970, p.8.
36. F. Powledge, op.cit. 1982, p.309.
37. Peter Thompson, Power in Tasmania, Australian Conservation Foundation, 1981.
38. Quoted in Peter Thompson, op.cit. 1981.
Leave a Comment