Both India and China need to solve their water problem

If you don’t have water you can’t make it. I’m wildly bullish on China but if they don’t solve the water problem there’s no China story. Likewise India has a water problem, worse in fact. There’s no question that India will be in worse shape than China. Northern India has gigantic problems. And that’s a nation of a billion people. Add another 1.3 billion in China and you have a big water problem.

View of Shanghai 

There are great opportunities in water. I haven’t found one that is publicly listed as of yet. I am sure there are several, I am just too lazy to find them. But I would love to find water plays that are substantial and serious.

The problem with water is that you can’t own it. Because if you do, when the crisis comes the politicians will hang you in the public square because you are exploiting Man’s God given right to water. And they will curse and scream at you. But if you find a way to solve the water problem they will build a monument for you. You will be very, very rich. But for goodness sake don’t own the water because if you do they will take it away from you, torture you and execute you.

Jim Rogers is a smart investor who co-founded the Quantum Fund with George Soros in 1973. By 1983 the fund gained more than 4000 percent.