Key Question for Discussion

Could water re-allocation be a useful means of re-balancing water uses in your basin or country to meet environmental flow needs, and if so, what would be the primary obstacles to such re-allocation?

The Over-Allocation Problem

Molden, D. ed. 2007.Water for Food, Water for Life, Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture. Earthscan. Part 4 – Chapter 16.

Six Major Challenges

• The water management system and the underlying water rights are not designed to enable re-allocation

• It is difficult to trade water or to reallocate water until water rights are defined

• There are large socio-economic and political costs and implications when re-allocating water from one sector to another

• Investment in water is a long-term process, so people are unwilling to give up water rights

• The localism of water - water is very specific to time and place which makes reallocating it between sectors and between purposes complex

• Limited institutional capacity to give effect to re-allocation

Roundtable Discussion

Discuss the full range of possible approaches for re-allocating water to environmental flows, including regulatory approaches, market approaches, and other strategies, and identify the primary opportunities and obstacles for such re-allocation.