K. E. Kemper

Integrated River Basin Management through Decentralization

1. River basin management at the lowest appropriate level: When and why does it (not) work in pracitave? - 2. Comparative analysis of case studies.- 3. Determinants of river basin management decentralization: Motivation, process, and performance.- 4. Australia: Murray-Darling basin.- 5. Brazil: Alton Tiete basin.- 6. Brazil: Jaguaribe basin.- 7. Canada: Fraser basin.- 8. Costa Rica: Tarcoles basin.- 9. Indonesia: Brantas basin.- 10. Poland: Warta basin.- 11. Spain: Guadalquivir basin.- 12. River basin management: Conclusions and implications.

Comparison of Institutional Arrangements for River Basin Management in Eight Basins

This study represents an effort toward understanding conditions that affect successful or unsuccessful efforts to devolve water resource management to the river basin level and secure active stakeholder involvement. A theoretical framework is used to identify potentially important variables related to the likelihood of success. Using a comparative case-study approach, the study examined river basins where organizations have been developed at the basin scale and where organizations perform management functions such as planning, allocation, and pricing of water supplies, flood prevention and response, and water quality monitoring and improvement. This paper compares the alternative approaches to basin governance and management adopted in the following river basins: the Alto-Tiete and Jaguaribe River Basins, Brazil; the Brantas River Basin, East Java, Indonesia; the Fraser River Basin, British Columbia, Canada; the Guadalquivir Basin, Spain; the Murray-Darling River Basin, Australia; the Tarcoles River Basin, Costa Rica; and the Warta River Basin, Poland. The analysis focuses on how management has been organized and pursued in each case in light of its specific geographical, historical, and organizational contexts and the evolution of institutional arrangements. The cases are also compared and assessed for their observed degrees of success in achieving improved stakeholder participation and integrated water resources management.

A Framework for Institutional Analysis of Decentralization Reforms in Natural Resource Management

Reforms directed toward decentralizing the management of natural resources are intended to increase stakeholder involvement and improve the effectiveness and sustainability of resource management arrangements though application of the principle of subsidiarity. The widespread advocacy of such reforms has given rise to numerous case-study examples around the world. This article presents a framework for such studies, based in institutional analysis, for researchers who wish to assess both the decentralization process and the outcomes of decentralization efforts. Rationale for the inclusion of variables and hypothesized relationships of variables to prospective outcomes are explained.

Institutional and Policy Analysis of River Basin Management: The Jaguaribe River Basin, Ceara, Brazil

The authors describe and analyze water resources reform and decentralization of river basin management in the state of Ceara, Northeast Brazil, the poorest part of the country. The Jaguaribe river basin is located entirely within the state of Ceara. With a drainage area of 72,560 square kilometers, it covers almost half of the states territory. The basin has 80 municipalities and more than 2 million people, about half rural and half urban, in primarily small towns, representing about a third of Cearas population. Precipitation in the basin is highly variable, ranging from 400 mm in the hinterland to 1,200 mm along the coast. Rivers in the basin are ephemeral and only flow during the rainy season. The key water management challenge is to capture the water in reservoirs in rainy years and to manage it such that it will last for several years, in case the following years are drought years. The other important challenge is the increasing dependence of the state capital Fortaleza, located in a different basin, on water from the Jaguaribe basin. Decentralization of decisionmaking has taken place at two levels. Devolution from the federal to the state level in the past 15 years was highly successful. The state has created its own Water Resources Management Company (COGERH) which is responsible for water resources management throughout the state. Decentralization from state to local level has been more partial. Although COGERH has decentralized the allocation of strategic reservoir waters to local institutions, many traditional water management attributions continue under its and the states purview, such as water permits, bulk water pricing, planning, operation and maintenance of hydraulic infrastructure, groundwater management, and control. The creation of sub-basin committees and user commissions has increased stakeholder participation of all types. Although so far stakeholder involvement has been limited largely to the negotiated allocation of water and to conflict resolution, these experiences represent a radical transformation in management practices, transforming water users from uninformed takers of water management decisions to informed and aware participants in the management process. That said, local stakeholders still have no say in some decisionmaking processes that affect them directly, such as bulk water pricing or inter-basin transfers to Greater Fortaleza, which continue solely under the control of state government agencies. The case of the Jaguaribe basin shows that (1) long-standing political support is of major importance in the development and implementation of water resources management reform, (2) that institutional arrangements for water resources management can successfully be adapted to local conditions to achieve positive outcomes, and (3) that even with initial conditions that seem to not favor change, decentralization can be achieved.

Decentralization of river basin management : a global analysis

Decentralization and increased stakeholder involvement have been major elements of water sector reform as ways to promote sustainable and integrated resource management particularly of river basins. Based on an analytical framework for relating decentralization and stakeholder involvement to improved river basin management, this paper infers several hypotheses about factors associated with greater or lesser likelihood of success of the decentralization process using data from 83 river basins worldwide. The results suggest that physical, political, economic, financial, and institutional characteristics of the basin do affect the process and the level of performance of the decentralization. In particular, the presence of water scarcity may be a stimulus to reform, uniting the stakeholders in the basin and leading to better performance; organized user groups push for the initiation of decentralization reforms but may be associated with costs to the process and difficulty of achieving decentralization; the existence of dispute resolution mechanisms supports stakeholder involvement and improves decentralization performance; where stakeholders accepted greater financial responsibility, complying with tariffs and contributing to the budget for basin management, the decentralization process and performance measures increased; basins with higher percentages of their budgets from external governmental sources benefited from better stability and support and it shows in the performance of the decentralization process.

Institutional and Policy Analysis of River Basin Management: The Alto-Tiete River Basin, Sao Paulo, Brazil

The authors describe and analyze river basin management in the most intensely urbanized and industrialized region of Brazil. The area covered by the Alto Tiete basin is almost coterminous with the Metropolitan Region of Sao Paulo. With a drainage area of 5,985 square kilometers (2.4 percent of the states territory), the basin encompasses 35 of the 39 municipalities and 99.5 percent of the population of Greater Sao Paulo. Population growth and urban sprawl in Greater Sao Paulo have been rapid and uncontrolled in recent decades. In 2000, 17.8 million people lived in the basin and by 2010 the population is estimated to reach 20 million. This massive human occupation was accompanied by the large-scale construction of water infrastructure, including dams, pumping stations, canals, tunnels, and inter-basin transfers to and from neighboring basins. Today, the Alto-Tiete basin is served by a complex hydraulic and hydrological system. Despite this extensive water infrastructure, the water availability of the region is still very low (201 m3-hab-an) and even lower than the semiarid regions of the Brazilian Northeast. The two key management issues to be addressed in the Alto Tiete basin are water quantity to supply a burgeoning population, and water quality which is deteriorating to a point where water availability for a range of uses is severely affected. Urban flood control and mitigation represents another major challenge in the basin. Although important achievements have been made over the past 15 years, the decentralization process - characterized by the creation of the Alto-Tiete committee and its subcommittees and some financing from the State Water Resources Fund - has yet to reveal measurable physical results such as the improvement of water quality or the rationalization of water use. It is undeniable that the Alto-Tiete committee and its subcommittees have already played an important leadership role around several issues. An extraordinary mobilization around water issues, problems, and management has occurred, even though solving many water-related problems may be beyond the capacity of the committees or even of the water resources management system as a whole. Charging for water remains one of the key issues in making the Alto Tiete Committee more relevant and giving it more say in water investment and management decisions. As long as such decisions remain at the individual agency level (both state and municipal), decisionmaking will remain fragmented and it is unlikely that key policy instruments to curb water demand increases and pollution will be implemented.

Management of the Guarani Aquifer System: Moving Towards the Future

Abstract With an extension of 1.2 million square kilometers, the Guarani Aquifer System is one of the largest transboundary groundwater systems in the world. It underlies parts of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay and was only relatively recently recognized as a transboundary resource. The four countries are now in the process of starting up a project to elaborate and implement a common institutional and technical framework for managing and preserving the Guarani Aquifer System for current and future generations. This paper briefly presents the Guarani Aquifer System Project. The preparation process is described due to its particular interest for other similar multi-country endeavors. Following the presentation of the project, the paper takes a forward-looking approach and analyzes the applicability of current international law for transboundary groundwater resources in the context of the Guarani Aquifer System. It concludes that while the basic principles espoused by international law relating to transboundary groundwater resources management are valid, they do not provide very specific guidance. The Guarani Aquifer System is unique and its complex features make it an eclectic case, which already is obliging all stakeholders to work out innovative measures—in the legal, institutional, technical, scientific, social, and economic realms—to develop appropriate activities for its sustainable management.

River Basin Management at the Lowest Appropriate Level: When and Why Does It (Not) Work in Practice?

When the research project that has led to the material and analysis presented in this book started, a great deal of investigation had been carried out into the application of the four so-called Dublin Principles of 1992 (ICWE 1992). These are frequently quoted in the water literature and have been guiding much of the thinking about water resource management in the past one and a half decades. Most discussion, however, has taken place around three of the Dublin Principles: those related to water as an economic good, the role of women in provision and management of water, and the need for integrated water resource management. Interestingly, the fourth principle, which concerns river basin management at the lowest appropriate level, was also being promoted and applied, but it was more or less taken for granted that it was a desirable practice, with little enquiry into whether it really worked and what the outcomes of its application were. These questions are, of course, vital for policymakers and water users throughout the world, especially in light of the number of river basin management efforts that are under way in the 21st century. Governments in several countries, multilateral financing agencies such as the World Bank, and other institutions such as the Global Water Partnership promote river basin organizations as a means of advancing river basin management at the lowest appropriate level. Accordingly, a study was carried out to consider those questions in a systematic way; this book presents the outcomes of the investigations into this issue.

Comparative Analysis of Case Studies

As noted in Chap. 1, this study of decentralized river basin management posed several questions. What factors might affect the likelihood of stakeholder involvement really contributing to effective basin-level resource management? Are efforts to conduct integrated water resource management at the basin level able to succeed? How can stakeholder involvement and effective resource management at the basin level be sustained over time and changing conditions? What factors might account for the longevity of decentralized arrangements in some cases and their demise in others? The eight river basin case studies were undertaken to pursue answers to questions such as these. This chapter discusses the eight cases with respect to those questions, while highlighting other factors that emerged as important during the course of the study.

Institutional and policy analysis of river basin management: the Gudalquivir River Basin, Spain

The authors describe and analyze river basin management in the Guadalquivir River Basin in Spain. The Guadalquivir river flows westerly across southern Spain, with nearly all of its 57,017 km2 drainage area within the region of Andalusia. Water management issues in this semi-arid, heavily agricultural, but rapidly urbanizing region include drought exposure, water allocation, water quality, and in some areas, groundwater overdraft. A river basin agency (Confederacion Hidrografica del Guadalquivir, or CH Guadalquivir) has existed within the basin since 1927, but its responsibilities have changed substantially over its history. For much of its life, CH Guadalquivirs mission was water supply augmentation through construction and operation of reservoirs, primarily to support irrigation, under central government direction with little provision for water user participation. Following the Spanish political systems transformation and Spains accession to the European Union, water law and policy changes greatly expanded CH Guadalquivirs responsibilities and restructured it to incorporate representation of some basin stakeholders. Although the basin agencys accomplishments in reservoir construction have been prodigious, its record of performance with respect to its newer responsibilities has been mixed, as have perceptions of its openness and responsiveness to basin interests other than irrigators.