Integrated water resource management, institutional arrangements, and land-use planning

A systems, holistic, or ecosystem approach is often advocated for water management, and has led to the emergence of integrated water resource management, or IWRM. Such an approach can be interpreted as `comprehensive' or `integrated', and analysts, planners, and managers need to understand the difference. Edge or boundary problems always are encountered when applying a holistic approach, and design of institutional arrangements cannot eliminate these problems but can minimize them. IWRM often does not have a statutory basis, which can lead to implementation challenges. By linking IWRM to land-use planning and official plans at the local level, IWRM can be given credibility, as well as be systematically connected to land-based issues. DOI:10.1068/a37224 (1) The Global Water Partnership is based on government agencies, public institutions, private companies, professional organizations, and multilateral development agencies committed to the Rio ^Dublin principles. The Global Water Partnership was created in 1996 through collaboration among the World Bank, the United Nations Development Program, and the Swedish International Development Agency. The GWP website states that ``membership is open to organizations that recognize the Dublin-Rio principles and are involved with issues related to integrated water resources management.'' The GWP has established a network of regional partnerships in each of Central America, Central and Eastern Europe, Central Asia and Caucasus, China, Eastern Africa, Mediterranean, Pacific, South America, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Southern Africa, and West Africa. institutional arrangements can be designed to facilitate IWRM. Then, attention turns to how IWRM can benefit from a closer connection to land-use planning. Specialists in land-use dynamics can judge what benefits might accrue to their field through more systematic attention to the insights emerging from work related to IWRM. This is neither a theoretical nor a case-analysis paper. Rather, I pragmatically reflect on insights and lessons drawn from the literature and over three decades of practical experience related to IWRM, in order to share them with specialists in land-use dynamics. However, before addressing the aspects identified above, in the next section attention focuses on the context for IWRM. In other words, what has stimulated the growing interest in this concept, how is it being interpreted, and what are the implications for planning and management? 2 Context for integrated water resource management Prior to the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (the Earth Summit) in Rio de Janeiro in June 1992, an International Conference on Water and the Environment occurred during late January 1992 in Dublin. The purpose of the Dublin conference was to identify priority issues related to freshwater, and to recommend actions to address them (International Conference on Water and the Environment, 1992). The ideas and proposals from Dublin were taken to the Earth Summit, and many of the recommendations were subsequently included in Agenda 21, the strategy for sustainable development in the 21st century (Young et al, 1994, page 1). The Dublin Statement on water and sustainable development, the main output from the conference, emerged from the deliberations of more than 500 people from 114 countries, 28 United Nations agencies and organizations, and 58 nongovernmental and intergovernmental organizations. The preamble asserted that concerted action was needed to reverse trends of overconsumption, pollution, and rising threats both from floods and from droughts. Action needed to come from local, national, and international levels, and four principles were presented to guide future initiatives. The first principle has been interpreted as a call for `integrated water resource management', the focus in this paper. This principle stated that `̀Fresh water is a finite and vulnerable resource, essential to sustain life, development and environment. Since water sustains life, effective management of water resources demands a holistic approach, linking social and economic development with protection of natural ecosystems. Effective management links land and water uses across the whole of a catchment area or groundwater area.'' The first principle emphasized that water problems cannot be treated in isolation, and indeed should be considered in relation to land-based and land-use planning issues. Notwithstanding the observation by Heathcote (1998, page 10) six years later that integrated watershed management was a relatively new concept, this therefore was not a revolutionary principle. For example, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD, 1989, page 12 ^ 20) had previously published `̀ guidelines for integration'' relative to water management. Support for a holistic or ecosystem approach has been provided by Born and Sonzogni (1995), Grumbine (1994; 1997), Margerum (1999a), Margerum and Born (1995; 2000), and Slocombe (1993a; 1993b; 1998a; 1998b). Experience in implementing this approach has been documented in Australia (Bellamy and Johnson, 2000; Bellamy et al, 1999; Johnson et al, 1996; Margerum, 1999b; Mitchell and Hollick, 1993; Mitchell and Pigram, 1989; Robinson and Humphries, 1997), Canada (Krantzberg and Houghton, 1996; Mitchell, 1983; Mitchell and Gardner, 1983; Ontario Watershed Planning Implementation Project Management Committee, 1997), the United States 1336 B Mitchell