The Asian Development Bank’s (ADB) “Water for All” policy stands as its water sector agenda in the Asian Region. The governing logic of this policy are tradable water rights, private sector participation/provision, full cost recovery and the elimination of subsidies. Disastrous results have followed after each and every project that is shaped by this flawed logic.

The Melamchi Project (Nepal)

In 2008, ADB’s multi-million Melamchi Project in Nepal showcased water-related corruption in the country. The $371 million project that aimed at conducting 170 million litres of water every day from the Melamchi Valley to the parched Kathmandu valley through a 26 km tunnel. Transparency International (TI) suggests that the project “was bogged down by vested interests.”

The controversy involved former prime minister Sher Bahadur Deuba and Minister Prakash Man Singh who allegedly awarded the contract to their supporters. The two ministers were subsequently found guilty and jailed, delaying the project which was conceived 17 years ago.

The Melamchi Project demonstrates that where private lucrative contracts are concerned, the “water for all” policy can only spawn corruption in the water sector and deprive many of their right to a vital government service.

Kirindi Oya Irrigation and Settlement Project (Sri Lanka)

The Kirindi Oya Irrigation and Settlement Project (KOISP) in south-eastern Sri Lanka is one project funded by ADB which generated water shortage and social unrest.

As a considerable number of citizens live in congested areas, the project aimed to develop a resettlement that was conducive to farming. Irrigation and the development of new lands became the project’s central focus in order to ensure employment, increased agricultural output, enhanced foreign exchange savings, and improved nutritional standards and income.iii

The project, however, was conducted without proper analysis of costs and benefits, not even with an Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) or participation from the community dwellers. Fertile fields were sacrificed for a reservoir that was rendered useless by the remaining infertile fields. Due to the shortage of irrigation water, laboring people had to move out of their village to seek for employment. Those who are fortunate enough to find one, and they are only a few, worked as farm laborers, earning for themselves a measly Rs 125 per day compared to their previous Rs 220 per day. Women in particular ended up looking for domestic work in the Middle East, making them vulnerable to horrible working conditions and exploitation. While some journeyed to Colombo and were prostituted. Children’s education had to give on account of family conflicts and territorial disputes.iv

Khulna Jessore Drainage Rehabilitation Project (Bangladesh)

Khulna Jessore Drainage Rehabilitation Project (KJDRP) was approved by the ADB in 1993 and completed in 1999. Contrary to ADB’s claim of a satisfactory project output, the KJDRP is one of the most controversial projects in Bangladesh. The Water for the People Network (WPN) and other local and civil society organizations hold the ADB accountable for funding a project that simultaneously inundated several hundred hectares of land and dried up rivers, making it impossible for the people to survive.

Earlier on, local communities had already expressed their suggestions for an effective way to manage tidal flows based on their own experience in the area. These alternative methods were ignored by the ADB. Wanton disregard for democratic participation and indigenous knowledge have caused KJDRP to fail miserably. Rather than effecting an increase in livelihoods and agricultural outputs, the KJDRP exacerbated environmental problems in the area. Civil society organizations assert that KJDRP resulted in “more water logging in Northwest area (Jessore) of the project, worsening the existing drainage problem as the Hamkura River dried up. They also claim that KJDRP contributed to the extinction of local fisheries and loss of livelihood of local fisher-folks.”v

On August 2006, a Writ Petition was filed by the Bangladesh Environmental Lawyers Association (BELA) and the Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust (BLAST). These organizations sought judicial intervention in order to address the suffering of the people who lived in the 144 affected villages. The High Court ruled that all the services, goods, medicines and other forms of support be delivered to the affected villages.vi

Clearly, ADB’s Melamchi Project, KOISP and KJDRP are proofs of the bank’s unconscionable methods of governance that has caused people their livelihood, peaceful coexistence and dignity.