“If you could rack up frequent-flyer miles on ships, trains and trucks, a little square plastic bottle of Fiji water would be eligible for some big-time rewards. 
Fiji hails from the island of Viti Levu in the South Pacific. That's about 5,600 miles, as the crow flies, to the port of Los Angeles and another 3,000 or so to East Coast restaurant tables and home fridges.”
These were some of the shocking statistics that I encountered last summer while researching a story on bottled water for The San Diego Union-Tribune.
Since then, when I request sparkling water at a restaurant I always ask where it comes from. If the water on the menu needed a passport to get to my table –- or even a long journey from inside the U.S. – I go with a glass of club soda instead.
Since the article ran, restaurants throughout the country have started to confront the issue.
In San Diego, George’s California Modern and Barbarella now offer local spring water, both plain and sparkling, in re-usable glass bottles. They join such restaurants as Pacifica Del Mar, Jack’s La Jolla and Island Prime who spearheaded the move, as reported in the U-T article entitled “Pour Choice.”
And, in New York City, where one’s choice of bottled water is likely to be as critical in “defining” a person as one’s choice of designer handbag, several big name hotels have joined such eateries as Mario Batali’s Del Posto and Gemma in nixing bottled water. Moreover, the city spent ¾ of a million bucks earlier this year in an ad campaign to get New Yorkers to drink from the tap.
But jet-setting bottled water – and the 41 million barrels of oil that are said to be used to make, transport and refrigerate bottled water each year – is only one aspect of the water “crisis.”
This week at New York University, a series entitled Critical Topics in Food will deal with the many aspects of what some call the central issue confronting the planet this century.
“WATER: A Global Discussion of a Critical Topic” will be held at the New York University Fales Library on Thursday, June 5, 2008 from 4 to 6 pm. Suggested donation is $10. Seats may be reserved by calling (212) 992-9018 or emailing rsvp.bobst@nyu.edu.
Panelists include
** Rick Moonen, creator of RM restaurant in Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, Las Vegas and author of soon-to-be-released cookbook “Fish Without A Doubt.”
** Marion Nestle, the Paulette Goddard Professor of Nutrition, Food Studies & Public Health at NYU and author of “What To Eat” and “Food Politics: Bacteria, Biotechnology, and Bioterrorism.”
** Alex Prud’homme, author of “The Cell Game” (about the ImClone scandal) and “My Life in France” which he wrote with Julia Child.
** and Yours Truly
The panel will be moderated by Clark Wolf, founder of Clark Wolf Company, a well-known food, restaurant and hospitality consulting firm, and will deal with issues ranging from sustainable seafood and ocean conservation, to the drowning of New Orleans by hurricane Katrina, the impact of looming droughts on agriculture around the world, and on bottled water – the good, the bad and the ugly.
The “Critical Topics in Food” series has already hosted panels on “Sustainable Agriculture vs. Industrial Food” and “Cooks Who Grown Their Own: A More Direct Route from Earth to Table.”
Thursday’s panel, as well as past presentation, can be seen on-line at NYU’s Media Archive.
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