• Less than one half of a percent of water on earth is available fresh water. The rest is ocean, or frozen in ice caps.

• More than a billion people lack access to safe drinking water, and more than 2.4 billion people lack adequate sanitation.

• More than five million people, most of them children, die each year from illnesses caused from drinking unsafe water.

• Global consumption of water is doubling every 20 years, more than twice the rate of human population growth.

• If current trends persist, by 2025 the demand for freshwater is expected to rise to 56 percent above the amount that is currently available - which will result in as much as 2/3 of the world population unable to access to clean water.

• The privatization of water industry is already a 400 billion dollar a year business globally - one third larger than global pharmaceuticals.

• In the U.S. alone, private water corporations generate revenues of more than a billion US dollars a year - four times the annual sales of Microsoft.

• Ten corporate giants are vying for control of water - The top three are French companies, a US, German and five of UK origin.

• Four of the top ten water companies are ranked among the 100 largest corporations in the world by the Global Fortune 500.

Source: AidWatch