Trans-boundary Processes: Interfacing micro and the macro

Ajaya DixitInstitutional Social and Environmental Transition-Nepal

River Waters: Perspectives and Challenges for Asia

New Delhi 20th September 2011

Combined basic properties of water (p, µ, v) with the physical factor (d, k) establishing an analytical tool to estimate friction factor and consequently head loss in pipe flows.

• Technology guided;

• Construction focused: Sectoral

• Political scientists and legal professionals negotiate civil engineers design:

• Bureaucratic arm of the nation-state can and will allocate and distribute benefits

But

considered ecosystem, quality, social, political, institutional and human

behaviour issues peripheral.

lacked inter-disciplinarity

• No conclusive understanding of what is going on or will happen: • Practice of science • Technology has distributive impacts• Benefits but also risks• Emerging stresses lead to resilience depletion • Governance and power balance in society • Scale question • Fast paced changes

The context

Ganga basin and Nepal

Tinau is tributary of the West Rapti, a tributary of Ghagra which is a tributary of the Ganga

3,200 km2

3,250 Km2 in Nepal 850 km2 in India

Source : Gyawali and Dixit 1999

Issues

• Drinking water supply: municipal, rural: quality, quantity • Health, hygiene• Sanitation (latrines, pollution, wastewater and solid waste)• Irrigation: surface: farmers built, agency built: competition and conflict • Groundwater: deep shallow manual, mechanised; overdraft • Flood disaster: inundation, sand casting, and bank cutting and river shifting• Drought: Forest fires• Poverty, livelihoods, gender and other types of social differential

Rising competition and disputes

Administrative Regions (Regional scales)

Ecological Region Total Population in 2001

Average coverage in %

Drinking Water Sanitation

Eastern Mountain

Hill

Tarai 54

Central Mountain 82

Hill 58

Tarai

Western Mountain

Hill

Tarai

Midwestern

Mountain

Hill

Tarai

Farwestern

Mountain 15

Hill

Tarai

Drinking water access (Nepal)

National scale

Population 106

Population (%) with access to

Latrines Electricity for lighting

BankingServices

Improved drinking water

30 40 82

Local scale

Source: District Profile DWSS/ADB Phase 3 (2000)

Region VDCs Drinking water supply coverage (%) Data unavailable (%)

>85 51-84 31-50 10-30 <10

East (9) 427 11 42 25 15 4 4 (48)

Mid West(7) 325 18 34 12 18 10 9 (49)

Far West (5) 194 10 47 17 13 5 7 (42)

• High levels of uncertainty in both local and regional climate changes, complex and poorly understood (IPCC AR4 “white” spot)

• Limited data stations (placement, lack of resources: finances and human) AR5?

• Adaptation to climate change embedded in dynamic socio- economic contexts with multiple change drivers: demographic,

land-use, informational, etc

• People also respond, autonomously but differently

• Political incentives and governance mechanism vary greatly, and with them the ability to develop and strategies (adaptation)

Climate Change Adaptation Lenses

Re-thinking Responses

• Systemic perspective; within and between systems issues

• Constraint Analysis

• Adaptive response

Adaptation is capacity to switch strategy as condition change (flexibility and incremental)

• If we define adaptation as planned responses to specific projected impacts, then specific climate-targeted responses are required.

If we conceive adaptation as an ongoing, process within complex evolving systems, then approaches that address points of vulnerability within systems are needed

To the conceptual

Not only

m3/s

Head

MW

Kwh

Ha irrigated etc

per capita lit/person etc.

But alsoEquity

Efficiency

Sustainability (flexibility and resilience)

Transparency

Participatory decision-making: gender and social inclusion

Social differentials, ecosystems and the requirement of the mute

For rivers and waters

Responses to all water problems need to be founded on principles of democratic

governance.

Thank you for your time