雀巢董事長 缺水比氣候變化更緊迫

World leaders must make water scarcity a bigger priority than climate change because the problem is far more urgent than global warming, the chairman of one of the biggest food companies has warned.

全球最大食品公司之一的董事長警告稱，世界各國領導人必須對缺水問題給予比氣候變化更優先的關注，因爲缺水問題遠比全球變暖更加緊迫。

“Today, you cannot have a political discussion anywhere without talking about climate change,” Nestlé chairman Peter Brabeck told the Financial Times. “Nobody talks about the water situation in this sense. And this water problem is much more urgent.

“如今，你在任何地方參與政治討論，都免不了談到氣候變化，”雀巢(Nestlé)董事長包必達(Peter Brabeck)對英國《金融時報》表示。“沒有人這麼討論水資源狀況，而水的問題其實緊迫得多。

“I am not saying climate change is not important. What I am saying is even without climate change we are running out of water and this has to become the first priority.”

“我並沒有說氣候變化不重要。我想說的是，即使沒有氣候變化，我們也在耗盡水資源，這必須成爲頭號優先考慮事項。”

Mr Brabeck’s comments come as businesses are having to adapt to rising water costs around the world and rivalries mount over poorly managed supplies of a resource long taken for granted.

包必達發表此言之際，企業正不得不適應世界各地不斷上漲的用水成本，同時，圍繞這種長期被忽視的資源的供應管理不善，各方的矛盾正在加劇。

In the past three years, companies have committed $84bn to improve the way they conserve, manage or obtain water, according to FT research and data from Global Water Intelligence, a market analysis firm.

根據英國《金融時報》的研究和市場分析公司“全球水資源情報”(Global Water Intelligence)的數據，過去三年裏，全球企業已承諾投資840億美元，改進他們節省、管理或獲取水資源的方式。

In the last year, BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto, two of the world’s biggest miners, agreed to spend $3bn on a desalination plant for a copper mine in Chile, curbing their use of fragile local water supplies.

去年，全球最大的兩家礦商必和必拓(BHP Billiton)和力拓(Rio Tinto)同意斥資30億美元，爲智利的一個銅礦建設海水淡化廠，以減少使用脆弱的當地供水。

Nestlé has set aside 38m Swiss francs ($42.5m) on new water-saving and treatment equipment at plants.

雀巢已撥出3800萬瑞士法郎（合4250萬美元），擬投資於旗下工廠新的節水和水處理設備。

Other companies, from Ford to Google, have invested in measures to stem their use of fresh water, an issue Google’s data centre head, Joe Kava, has warned is “the big elephant in the room” for data companies, which can need thousands of gallons daily to cool centres.

從福特(Ford)到谷歌(Google)，其它公司已投資於各種措施減少各自的淡水使用量。谷歌數據中心負責人喬•卡瓦(Joe Kava)警告，這個問題對於數據公司就像是“房間裏的大象”，因爲這些公司每天可能需要數千加侖的水來冷卻數據中心。

Andrew Metcalf, an investment analyst, said: “Water scarcity is finally starting to bite financially.” It already has “credit-negative implications” for the mining industry, he said in a report last year for Moody’s, the credit rating agency.

投資分析師安德魯•梅特卡夫(Andrew Metcalf)表示：“缺水終於開始造成財務影響。”他在去年爲信用評級機構穆迪(Moody’s)撰寫的一份報告中表示，這個問題已經對採礦業產生了“負面信用影響”。