A/HRC/7/5 page 18 countries by IMF and the World Bank. Just three companies, Veolia Environnement, formerly Vivendi Environnement, Suez Lyonnaise des Eaux and Bechtel (USA), control a majority of private concessions worldwide. 46. Recent evidence on water privatization suggests that, while in some cases it can bring increased efficiency, it often means higher prices, which the poorest cannot afford. The case of Cochabamba, Bolivia, is now famous.43 A study on the privatization of water services in Manila44 shows some positive effects, with an additional 1 million connected to the network between 1997 and 2003, but the price also rose by 425 per cent, making such services too expensive for the poor. The study suggests that the poorest are doubly discriminated against because prices are highest in the poorest communities and water quality has deteriorated rapidly in the poorest parts of the city. The study concluded that there was no independent mechanism for accountability and that affected populations were not able to participate in the process. The same conclusions have been put forward by WaterAid and Tearfund, in a study funded by the Government of the United Kingdom on the effects of water privatization in 10 developing countries.45 47. Despite the fact that the transnational corporations increasingly control our food and water system, there are still relatively few mechanisms in place to ensure that they respect standards and do not violate human rights. Former Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali noted in 1996 that the global reach of TNCs was not matched by a coherent global system of accountability. 48. In many cases, transnational corporations have voluntarily chosen to abide by human rights standards, adopting internal policies and codes of conduct. Nestlé is a case in point. But several NGOs have raised concerns that Nestlé dominates the market for breastmilk substitutes in many countries while its marketing practices violate the internationally agreed International Code of Marketing of Breast-milk Substitutes.46 United Nations agencies, including the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), have expressed similar preoccupations.47 49. Major intergovernmental instruments which apply to the activities of private transnational corporations include the OECD Guidelines, under which all adhering Governments (the OECD member States and Argentina, Brazil and Chile) are obliged to establish national contact points 43 See A/58/330, para. 36. 44 N. Roseman, “The human right to water under the conditions of trade liberalisation and privatisation - a study on the privatisation of water supply and wastewater disposal in Manila”, 2003. 45 E. Gutierrez, B. Calaguas, J. Green and V. Roaf, “New rules, new roles: does private sector participation benefit the poor?”, 2003. 46 47 www.ibfan.org. S. Lewis, “Malnutrition as a human rights violation”, ACC/SCN, SCN News, No. 18, 1999.