On April 15, 2021, Marcel Boyer, Emeritus Professor in the Department of Economics at the Université de Montréal, CIRANO Researcher and Fellow, has been invited to participate in a roundtable discussion on the determinants of water prices as part of the work of the commission of inquiry on the takeover of water resources by private interests and its consequences created by the French National Assembly.

In addition to Marcel Boyer, this roundtable brought together Mr. Stéphane Saussier, professor at the Institut d'administration des entreprises Paris-Sorbonne, director of the Economics of Public-Private Partnerships chair, Mr. Alexandre Mayol, lecturer at the Institut d'administration des entreprises Paris-Sorbonne, and Ms. Marielle Montginoul, researcher at the joint research unit Gestion de l'eau, acteurs, usages (G EAU), National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and the Environment.

The objective of this commission, created on February 9, is to examine the various aspects of the takeover of water by identifying emblematic cases of financialization, predation, corruption and mismanagement of water by private operators in France, particularly in the overseas territories; the role of the State and the organizing authorities of drinking water and wastewater services in the cases identified; their consequences in terms of changes in the conditions of collection, distribution, sanitation and billing of drinking water for both public finances and users (ageing and deterioration of networks, changes in the cost of water and sanitation, degree of impediment to access to these networks).

Watch the video retransmission of this round table on the website of the French National Assembly