1 August 1999
WCD in São Paulo to hear about large dams in Latin America

For the first time in Latin America, governments, companies, and NGOs involved in the debate over large dams will meet to discuss the economic, social, and environmental impacts of dams. The World Commission on Dams will hold its Latin America Regional Consultation on Dams on 12-13 August, at the Rebouças Convention Center in São Paulo, Brazil.

The meeting will debate the positive and negative impacts of dams in Latin America. Brazil is the largest dam-building country in South America, with 600 dams providing more than 90 per cent of the country's electricity (see fact sheet, attached). Argentina has 101 large dams, followed by Chile with 87 and Venezuela with 72. Speakers from other Latin American countries, including Paraguay, Guatemala, and Mexico, also will address the meeting.
The São Paulo meeting is one of a series of regional consultations that will help the WCD prepare its final report, to be issued by mid-2000. The WCD also is preparing eight case studies of individual dams around the world, including the Tucuruí dam in the Brazilian Amazon (please see press release).

An important debate

Of the estimated 800 000 dams around the world, approximately 45 000 are considered large (over 15 meters in height). Another 1 600 large dams are under construction worldwide in an industry whose annual turnover is estimated at $50 billion or more. Dams provide developmental and security benefits by controlling floods and providing irrigation and hydropower. Brazil is among the 20 countries in which hydropower is the basis of energy generation; globally, hydropower is believed to conserve up to 600 million tons of oil every year. However, dams and reservoirs also can mean the loss of plant, animal, and aquatic biodiversity, as well as having significant human impacts: an estimated four million people are displaced globally each year by dam projects.
From 1970 to 1979, 5 415 dams were built worldwide, doubling the number constructed in the 1950s. But the pace of dam building has fallen dramatically since the mid-1980s, due to concerns about the financial, social and environmental impacts of dams, among other reasons.

The World Commission on Dams

WCD was established in 1998 at the behest of pro- and anti-dam interests who wanted to break the stalemate that had developed between them regarding management and development of dams as a key aspect of water resource management. The two sides first met in Gland, Switzerland in 1997, in a meeting brokered by the World Bank and the IUCN-The World Conservation Union (an umbrella organisation of over 800 NGOs and government agencies involved in environmental issues).

At Gland, the two sides agreed to help set up an independent, non-partisan commission on dams that would conduct a global review of the development effectiveness of large dams; assess alternatives to dams; and establish criteria and guidelines for the assessment and implementation of future dam projects and their alternatives. It should be noted that the WCD does not have a mandate to intervene in or adjudicate current controversies over dams. The WCD's work will end with the publication of its final report next year.

The Commission & Secretariat

With its Secretariat based in Cape Town, South Africa, the Commission is chaired by Professor Kader Asmal. A renowned anti-apartheid fighter and human rights lawyer in the UK where he lived in exile, Professor Asmal returned to South Africa in 1994 to join President Nelson Mandela's cabinet as Water Affairs and Forestry Minister. In June he was named Education Minister but continues to chair the WCD. The Commission's other 11 members are eminent persons from various regions of the world and from government, the NGO sector, academia, and industry. (Please see list of Commissioners.)

WCD's Support

WCD's budget comes from across the spectrum of parties concerned with global public policymaking on this central aspect of water resource management. Donations have come from governments; NGOs such as the Worldwide Fund for Nature; foundations such as Ted Turner's UN Foundation; companies such as ABB; and major utilities, as well as from its founding sponsors, the World Bank and IUCN. The Commission still requires US$1.9 million to fulfill its budgetary requirement of $9.8 million.