Coronavirus State Intervention
& Water
Pandemics
Caribbean Life, March 20-26, 2020 11
almost surely be dwarfed by the four
million people likely to die this year
from the lack of safe WAter, Sanitation
and Hygiene (WASH).
And the water pandemic deaths will
not make headlines.
Those who die due to the water pandemic
are, naturally, poor. They do not
trade or travel internationally, they do
not have mortgages, they do not buy
insurance. Callous world financial markets
pay little attention.
The ongoing water pandemic is even
more distressing because many prerequisites
for eradicating it already exist.
We know how many people do not have
WASH, and we know where they live.
We even know precisely what to do —
the technologies needed are available,
including low-cost ones.
The problem is primarily a lack of
political will and finance, and each, of
course, connects to the other.
The water pandemic is not particularly
“sexy,” nor visible in the myriad
of other problems that many countries
face. Even a decent politician who
makes it a priority issue will likely be
distracted within her or his term.
As for financing, about 20 years ago
we needed an estimated USD 24 billion
per year on average over 10 years to
bring low-cost, safe water and sanitation
to all those who needed it then (inclusive
of population growth) 7.
That was probably an underestimate,
but even that number was never met.
And the shortfall of some USD 17 billion
was about equal to annual pet food purchases
in Europe and USA…
The absolute numbers required now
have not changed much — roughly
USD 28 billion per year (from 2015 to
2030) to extend basic WASH services
to all those unserved 8. With “safely
managed” “continuously available,” and
“improved” services, the annual requirement
rises to USD 114 billion. Yet, four
years into the SDG era, we have not
been able to meet the required financing
levels even for basic services.
To meet the goals by 2030, we will,
naturally, need more in the remaining
decade, but it is difficult to express optimism
that this will be achieved, even
though the investment required represents
just around 3% of NATO’s total
annual military spending.
It would also be naive to think that
suddenly the world would focus entirely
on the water pandemic.
And, let’s face it, resolving a big
development problem like the lack of
WASH requires political stability and
the absence of corruption, neither of
which is the case in many of the most
acute problem areas. So, most likely and
unfortunately, progress will only continue
slowly.
Continued from Page 10
ees dropping all their other work to
focus on making kits. Production of
the company’s fifty or so other products
temporarily ceased for two weeks.
Molecular biologists with PhDs stopped
research and development to work on
the kit assembly line, as senior scientists
packaged the kits.
In Western countries, similar examples
can be seen in the conversion of
industries to defence production during
war. In most countries, state assistance
has eased and accelerated such
transitions. Increased defence procurement
caused US economic growth to
speed up after the 1937-38 recession to
17-20% annually during 1941-43.
Centrally planned economies were
even better at quickly achieving structural
shifts while maintaining full
employment. In the late 1930s and
early 1940s, just before and during
the Second World War, the Soviet
Union moved considerable resources
from agriculture to industry, and from
light to heavy industry, especially for
defence.
In 1940, Germany produced twice
as much steel and more armaments
than the Soviet Union, but by 1943,
the USSR had surpassed Germany in
producing tanks, aircrafts and artillery,
decisively changing the course of
the war.
Eight decades later, Professor Jamie
Galbraith has argued that there is “no
acceptable alternative” to the US government
covering the full costs of testing
and treating Covid-19 cases, without
exception and legal risk; to be
effective, care should be universal and
free of cost.
If the Covid-19 epidemic continues
to spread quickly, the ability of countries
to quickly redeploy resources will
be crucial, not only for fighting the
pandemic, but also to overcome the
likely recession.
During the 2008-09 Great Recession,
China’s huge fiscal stimulus package
mitigated the economic slowdown. Its
growth rate dropped from 14% in 2007
to 9% in 2009, as some other countries
experienced their deepest post-war
recessions, even contractions.
Betting only on market forces to
do the necessary is not only slow, but
also dangerous. The capacity to cope
with the inevitable forthcoming slowdown
will depend crucially on how governments
manage resources to guide
structural transitions.
This opinion draws on an earlier
paper by Popov which can be read at:
https://doc-research.org/2020/03/
how-to-deal-with-the-coronavirus-economic
recession-social-solidarity-andstate
intervention/
Vladimir Popov is a research director
in the Dialogue of Civilizations
Research Institute in Berlin.
Continued from Page 10
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