Integrated water resources management: call of the day

The new emerging thought processes in our vision of water recognize that the old modes of supply development, through large constructions for harnessing the crucial natural resource, are unsustainable. This realization of the need for holistic modes of water management has subsequently been reflected in some of the policy actions of the developed world, primarily with the dawning of the ecological concerns.

This led to the emergence of a new paradigm that is popularly known as IWRM (Integrated Water Resources Management), which is summarized below.

Water needs to be viewed as an integral part of the global hydrological cycle, and not as a stock of material resource to be used for the satisfaction of human requirements.

Supply of ever-increasing volumes of water is not a prerequisite for continued economic growth. Hence, solutions to water resource development problems need to be found beyond supply side management.

Clear and strict prioritization of various types of needs and demands for water is needed, including those of the ecosystems.

There is a need for comprehensive assessment of water development projects, which maintain the integrity of the full hydrological cycle.

A transparent and interdisciplinary knowledge base for the understanding of the social, ecological, and economic roles played by water resources is required.

Droughts and floods are to be visualized in the wider context of the ecological processes associated with them.

Appropriate new social and economic instruments for promoting careful and efficient uses of water resources, or for the reduction of damage to their quality from pollution, should be developed.

There is a need for restructuring the existing institutional frameworks for water resource development at local, state, river basin, and national levels, in order to make it equitable, sustainable, and participatory.

Following these paradigm shifts in notions worldwide, various other means to conserve water instream are becoming evident in several parts of the world. By 2001, nearly 500 dams in the United States and elsewhere were removed, and the movement towards river restoration is accelerating. The Murray-Darling Basin Commission in Australia is seriously contemplating on extending financial encouragement to farmers for saving on their allocation of irrigation water, and to allow the savings to remain in-stream. In another instance, Chile's National Water Code of 1981 established a system of water rights that are transferable and independent of land use and ownership. The most frequent transaction in Chile's water markets is the ‘renting’ of water between neighbouring farmers with different water requirements.

This is only a beginning, and a lot needs to be done. Water policies in many parts of the developing world still remain in the folds of the old paradigm of water supply augmentation plans. There is no doubt that the new statement of water management has to be adopted fast in the framework of water policies. Governments in the developing world need to realize that demand side management is the key to step into the regime of this emerging paradigm for water governance, which, according to Malin Falkenmark of Stockholm International Water Institute, can integrate land, water, and ecosystems, and promote the three E's: two human dependent ones (social equity and economic efficiency) and one related to ecosystem (environmental sustainability).

Editorial