The important role of soft options
Hard options (large-scale dams and irrigation projects) do not adequately provide freshwater resources in an equitable and sustainable manner in the Awash basin and therefore do not improve resilience against the impacts of climate change. Hard options actually may be amplifying the problem! This is especially apparent amongst the smaller and poorer communities within the basin, such as local farmers who commonly suffer water shortages.
The basin, however, can't start from scratch: these developments have cost millions and many sectors are reliant on the resultant flow of freshwater. Instead, the management of such developments could change in order to help the Awash River Basin improve its freshwater security - through the use of soft options.
Firstly, what do I mean by 'soft options'? Soft options are institutional changes instead of infrastructure changes. For example, these include the decentralisation of facilities, flexible institutions, and human capital development schemes. Of course, it is beyond this blog's scope and capability to offer rigorous and thorough analyses of management practices and the practicality of each (this isn't a governance analysis after all!). Instead, I will only be able to provide a brief discussion, but this report offers lots more detail if you're interested!
Greater participation:
As mentioned, it is often the poorest, or those with the least power, that experience the lowest access to water. Climate change impacts would most adversely affect them. It is imperative that AwBA (Awash River Basin Authority) engages beyond their typical water community, with greater participation between different levels of power with the local community having a say in the development, distribution and management of water resources. Fundamentally, the current system of water governance must be decentralised: the idea that benefits can only be for large-scale commercial and plantation farms at the expense of others must be deconstructed.
Greater coordination:
With greater participation, there must be greater coordination. Koko reservoir currently releases water that does not fit with downstream water use. Coordination would ensure more efficient water use. Additional to improving coordination between users, there must also be improved coordination between government bodies: regional governments operate separately from the AwBA and therefore AwBA is oblivious to the regional agenda for water resource development, which hinders the ability to plan and develop water management schemes. For instance, the Fentale Irrigation Scheme is managed by the Oromia Regional State and the AwBA has no supervision or knowledge of the scheme (Mosello et al., 2015).
Greater investment:
The relevant policies, laws, and efficient water bureaucracy must be strong to implement the above points through greater technical, financial and social investments. These in turn fundamentally improve the basin's water capacity. For instance, investment in such institutions can harbour effective negotiations between different user groups; local communities are unable to currently negotiate with large-scale commercial farms and state enterprises due to power asymmetry. The AwBA must deal with this.
The basin, however, can't start from scratch: these developments have cost millions and many sectors are reliant on the resultant flow of freshwater. Instead, the management of such developments could change in order to help the Awash River Basin improve its freshwater security - through the use of soft options.
Firstly, what do I mean by 'soft options'? Soft options are institutional changes instead of infrastructure changes. For example, these include the decentralisation of facilities, flexible institutions, and human capital development schemes. Of course, it is beyond this blog's scope and capability to offer rigorous and thorough analyses of management practices and the practicality of each (this isn't a governance analysis after all!). Instead, I will only be able to provide a brief discussion, but this report offers lots more detail if you're interested!
Greater participation:
As mentioned, it is often the poorest, or those with the least power, that experience the lowest access to water. Climate change impacts would most adversely affect them. It is imperative that AwBA (Awash River Basin Authority) engages beyond their typical water community, with greater participation between different levels of power with the local community having a say in the development, distribution and management of water resources. Fundamentally, the current system of water governance must be decentralised: the idea that benefits can only be for large-scale commercial and plantation farms at the expense of others must be deconstructed.
Greater coordination:
With greater participation, there must be greater coordination. Koko reservoir currently releases water that does not fit with downstream water use. Coordination would ensure more efficient water use. Additional to improving coordination between users, there must also be improved coordination between government bodies: regional governments operate separately from the AwBA and therefore AwBA is oblivious to the regional agenda for water resource development, which hinders the ability to plan and develop water management schemes. For instance, the Fentale Irrigation Scheme is managed by the Oromia Regional State and the AwBA has no supervision or knowledge of the scheme (Mosello et al., 2015).
The relevant policies, laws, and efficient water bureaucracy must be strong to implement the above points through greater technical, financial and social investments. These in turn fundamentally improve the basin's water capacity. For instance, investment in such institutions can harbour effective negotiations between different user groups; local communities are unable to currently negotiate with large-scale commercial farms and state enterprises due to power asymmetry. The AwBA must deal with this.
The improved governance of hard options may offer a way
for the basin to provide freshwater in a more sustainable and equitable manner,
potentially gearing the basin up for climate change impacts. However, implementing
institutional changes can be difficult! Firstly, it requires a huge amount of
political will to ensure investment in both human and financial capital. It may
be relatively easy to write a strategic plan that states who will do what, when
it will be done, and how much it will cost, but how do you ensure this plan is
conducted? Can decentralisation properly occur and is decentralisation
efficient? These are my main worries.
Finally, addressing the management of freshwater resources in
the basin may improve access and availability (especially amongst the poorest) through
greater coordination and inclusion, but fundamentally it does not increase the
absolute amount of the finite water resource. The success of soft options
therefore can only go so far when demand for freshwater is so high; the basin
must look for ways to also increase the absolute amount of freshwater in
the basin to satisfy water demands!
Hi Ruth,
ReplyDeleteGreat post, and I agree with a lot of what you say. I covered some of this in my own blog and came to a very similar conclusion. Decentralisation is very important, and making sure projects actually get conducted is also very important. A great paper I read on this by Frederick Golooba-Mutebi might interest you, I posted the link below. He gives many examples of what happens specifically when no one checks on whether implementation occurs adequately. He also says that not only decentralisation is important, but (since decentralisation spreads responsibility between a greater number of actors) making sure it happens in a balanced way, so that no party ends up having a responsibility too great to handle, or too little incentive to do their work.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com.libproxy.ucl.ac.uk/doi/10.1002/pad.1638/abstract
(and the post where I mention it: http://waterpoliticsandafrica.blogspot.com.mt/2017/12/the-implementation-gap-part-i.html)