TEL AVIV, Israel—There are some places in the world where water is big business, and Israel, a land of water scarcity, is one of them.
So important is water conservation in Israel, that the issue is discussed everywhere from dinnertime conversation to corporate offices.
Booky Oren, chairman of an Israeli company called Miya, uses his 25 years of business experience to help Israel continue to lead the world in water technology development. Oren was previously chairman of the board of directors of Mekorot, Israel’s national water company until 2006.
“I saw water as a big business,” says Oren.
He used his business savvy to create Miya. But his passion for water technologies—delivery, treatment, and control—is as much a smart business move as a race against running out of a limited resource.
“In the past 80 years the population [of Israel] grew by 25 times,” said Oren from his spacious office in Tel Aviv earlier this year. “There’s no way the water grew by 25 times.”
It’s simple math like Oren’s assessment that’s behind the Israeli private sector approach to developing newer and better ways to make more water.
So important is water conservation in Israel, that the issue is discussed everywhere from dinnertime conversation to corporate offices.
Booky Oren, chairman of an Israeli company called Miya, uses his 25 years of business experience to help Israel continue to lead the world in water technology development. Oren was previously chairman of the board of directors of Mekorot, Israel’s national water company until 2006.
“I saw water as a big business,” says Oren.
He used his business savvy to create Miya. But his passion for water technologies—delivery, treatment, and control—is as much a smart business move as a race against running out of a limited resource.
“In the past 80 years the population [of Israel] grew by 25 times,” said Oren from his spacious office in Tel Aviv earlier this year. “There’s no way the water grew by 25 times.”
It’s simple math like Oren’s assessment that’s behind the Israeli private sector approach to developing newer and better ways to make more water.
“We are moving from the collection era to the production era,” he states.
Since natural water sources aren’t plentiful enough, other methods used include seawater and brackish water desalination. Israel already has three large desalination plants owned as joint corporate ventures, some of the largest in the world, and plans to build two more. Oren says this process of taking seawater and making it potable for human consumption is the wave of the future.
Conventional water sources include the Sea of Galilee, and mountain and coastal aquifers. The Sea of Galilee is by far the largest source of freshwater in the country, providing 24.7 billion cubic feet of water a year.
In the northeast of Israel, in a region called the Golan Heights where the Galilee lives, water provides a different kind of business. The Ein Gev kibbutz sits on the eastern shore of the Sea of Galilee and survives mainly from tourism. The kibbutz has a resort, a restaurant with nearly 1,000 seats, and a boat that takes 300,000 pilgrims a year to the spot where Jesus is said to have walked on water.
Amos Om, 72, who helped found the kibbutz and still works there, knows all too well the sensitive politics of water in his neighborhood. The eastern side of the Sea of Galilee is near Syria and the hotly-contested area that is officially a demilitarized zone. Before the defining war of 1967, Syria gained temporary access to the sea—and with it political power.
But today it is Israel that officially controls the entire Sea of Galilee, and its massive water supply. In the Golan Heights, as in other parts of the country, the Israeli government’s water authority, Mekorot, controls the flow and allotment of water to customers, including farmers. Mekorot does not set policy, but rather administers services as a national company on behalf of the Israeli government.
“We are like the operational arm of the water authority,” says Lior Frumkes V.P. of Business Development for Mekorot.
Frumkes adds that their work, though for the government, takes place in a competitive corporate climate, and they are fully part of the corporate race to find better, faster, and new methods to administer and process the resource.
“It’s a very unique company,” he says.
With Mekorot as with other companies dealing in the water business, competition is tight and there is always an eye on the future.
One approach Israel’s water entrepreneurs take is international relationships that result in shared technology and skill sets.
An example is a three-year relationship they have with a company in Argentina called “5 De Septiembre” based in Buenos Aires. Frumkes says both parties understand the benefits of cooperation, and want to learn from each other.
Israel’s reputation for innovation is part of the reason they are approached so frequently by other countries like Argentina to cooperate on projects. Argentina is looking to learn from Israel’s expertise in innovations in water delivery and treatment.
But Frumkes thinks the pursuit of better technology and delivery systems goes deeper than just doing business.
But today it is Israel that officially controls the entire Sea of Galilee, and its massive water supply. In the Golan Heights, as in other parts of the country, the Israeli government’s water authority, Mekorot, controls the flow and allotment of water to customers, including farmers. Mekorot does not set policy, but rather administers services as a national company on behalf of the Israeli government.
“We are like the operational arm of the water authority,” says Lior Frumkes V.P. of Business Development for Mekorot.
Frumkes adds that their work, though for the government, takes place in a competitive corporate climate, and they are fully part of the corporate race to find better, faster, and new methods to administer and process the resource.
“It’s a very unique company,” he says.
With Mekorot as with other companies dealing in the water business, competition is tight and there is always an eye on the future.
One approach Israel’s water entrepreneurs take is international relationships that result in shared technology and skill sets.
An example is a three-year relationship they have with a company in Argentina called “5 De Septiembre” based in Buenos Aires. Frumkes says both parties understand the benefits of cooperation, and want to learn from each other.
Israel’s reputation for innovation is part of the reason they are approached so frequently by other countries like Argentina to cooperate on projects. Argentina is looking to learn from Israel’s expertise in innovations in water delivery and treatment.
But Frumkes thinks the pursuit of better technology and delivery systems goes deeper than just doing business.
