Water for communities first

Ontairo’s water taking rules are broken. The province does not give access to municipalities priority access to our water.

For example, Nestlé has a water bottling plant in Aberfoyle, just outside Guelph. Right now, they take 4.8 million litres of water from area wells each day.

What’s happening?

The permit in Aberfoyle has expired and is under review by the Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change. 

They’ve also applied for permission to start taking even more water from another well. If approved, this means they would have permission to take an additional 1.6 million litres of water per day, making a total of 6.4 million litres per day that they could take.

What’s the problem?

Nestlé, a billion dollar corporation, pays only $3.71 for each million litres of water they take. That means they would pay only $20.03 for the 6.4 millions litres of water they could take each day. 

• 6.4 million litres of water requires manufacturing, transporting and disposing of millions of packages. Even with recycling, the cost and impact on the environment is huge.
• Water is a finite resource. We’re facing droughts because of climate change. We need to put food and water for our communities first – before corporate interests.

How can we fix this?

There are several actions that we are recommending the government take – to protect our water now and in the future:
1. Fix the Permit To Take Water process to prioritize community water use.
2. Deny Nestlé the test pump for their Middlebrook well.
3. Don’t renew Nestlé’s Aberfoyle and Dolime Quarry’s water taking permits at this time.
4. Raise the water taking fee to make sure private corporations pay their fair share

What can you do?

Send a message to the Minister of Environment today via our easy to use form>> 

You can also contact the Premier to ask her to put water for communities first:

Phone: 416-325-1941/ 1-800-387-5559
Mail: Kathleen Wynne, Premier
Legislative Building
Queen’s Park
Toronto, Ontario M7A 1A1
Email: premier@ontario.ca

For more information:

Welllington Water Watchers: wellingtonwaterwatchers.ca

Save Our Water: saveourwater.ca