Almost 200,000 Signatures Have Made a Difference: US Forest Service Puts Nestlé on Warning

The US Forest Service has directly contacted Nestlé, reports Credo, where a petition was launched to stop the water-privatizing company from stealing California’s water through the ambivalence of one of the arms of the United States Departments of Agriculture.

The Forest Service told Nestlé:

“Should the drought continue, as we all expect it will, the State or local authorities may make further demands for conservation measures from all water users.”

While this isn’t exactly a strong communication to a company who has been pumping over 80 million gallons from Sacramento aquifers every year with a permit that expired 27 years ago (amid the California drought crisis) – it’s a start.

Your voices have certainly helped. Credo states that already 189,000 activists have signed a petition telling the US Forest Service that they need to immediately halt Nestlé’s illegal water extraction, which makes them millions every year when experts say that California has less than year of water left.

The US Forest Service’s motto is “caring for the land and serving people,” but without further pressure on Nestlé to stop taking California’s water illegally, what “people” do they serve?

Nestlé has a habit of taking what isn’t theirs. The former CEO has even stated that water should be privatized (meaning collected by corporations, then sold back to you) and is not a human “right.”

While water should not be wasted, and we all ‘pay’ for water whether it is through good stewardship or to have it on tap through a municipality, Nestlé would like to dominate the world’s water the way Monsanto dominates the world’s seed. Right now, they are taking California’s water for free, and selling it back to people whose land is parched and mouths are thirsty.

Be sure to sign one of the many petitions to urge the US Forest Service to stop Nestlé, and if you see Arrowhead and Pure Life brands of water, don’t purchase them – they are owned by the company.

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Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Image