Friday 8 January 2010

The Trade of the Century

When you think about hot commodities right now, you probably don't
think of water. Yet the price of water in some parts of the world is
rising...sometimes very quickly. Take California, for example.

Mark Swatek is CEO of Southwest Water Co., a water utility that serves
California and the Southwestern US. You may accuse him of talking his
book when he says: "One of the fastest growing commodity prices is the
price of metropolitan water [in Southern California]."

It may be an exaggeration, but not by much. Since 2007, the
Metropolitan Water District of Southern California has increased its
water rates from $574 an acre-foot to $781 an acre-foot - a 36%
increase. (An acre-foot is the amount of water needed to flood a plain
of one acre to a depth of one foot - or about 326,000 gallons.)

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