Four Worlds International Institute Directory

As far as I've able to ascertain, the U.S. press gave the August 2008 Stockholm Water Conference short shrift.  --  The New York Times printed no article on the conference, though it did did post an article on its Dot Earth blog.  --  The Washington Post took no notice of the conference.  --  The Los Angeles Times said not a word.  --  The Boston Globe published no article that week, though back in March it took notice the winner of SIWI's annual prize and reported that Prof. John Anthony Allan of King's College at the University of London would receive the $150,000 cash award for creating the concept of "virtual water," which measures the amount of water that is embedded in the production of food and industrial products.  --  Nothing appeared in the Chicago Tribune.  --  The Christian Science Monitor published a gardening piece on how to "save water with succulents," but published nothing about the Stockholm Water Conference.  --  Is it not likely that this dearth of news about the global water crisis can be attributed to the corporate ownership of the U.S. press and the financial interest of its owners in plans for water privatization, in which they are heavily invested?  --  As Maud Barlow and Tony Clarke remarked in their well-known book, "As for other commodities, the ground is now being laid for a commodity futures market involving speculation in water prices. . . . [C]apital is being pooled to finance massive pipeline schemes for the delivery of water and energy around the world" (Blue Gold: The Fight to Stop the Corporate Theft of the World's Water [New York: The New Press, 2005], pp. 93-94).   Is anyone campaigning to overcome the media near-blackout on these issues?