1. Background

World water and food resources are under pressure. Population growth and development will increase aggregate demand for freshwater just as climate change is predicted to affect the historical spatial and temporal patterns of water availability. Since hydrologic cycles and agricultural systems are so closely linked, human societies must plan for change in both in relation to increasing demand and predicted increases in water-related disasters such as flood and drought. There is great need for integrated water resources management (IWRM). To date, however, IWRM has not achieved its potential.

2. Objectives

This project conducts extensive historical and contemporary evaluation of several local- and basin-scale agricultural water management regimes, seeking principles that promote, or blockages that hinder, efficient water-use. Combining best quantitative measures of water flow, use and quality, irrigation engineering, historical description and institutional analysis in several case-study sites, it evaluates and describes scenarios for culturally relevant and institutionally and economically feasible re-design of local water management regimes. It seeks to improve the IWRM framework’s adaptability to local cultural and economic contexts, as local management performance directly affects local livelihoods and environment, and to highlight linkages between local and higher-scale management practices and contexts. In collaboration with users and authorities, the project then turns to fundamental re-design of local land and water management systems in relation to the combined social, economic and environmental challenges of the future.

3. Main Case Study Areas

(1)GAP Region of southeast Turkey
(2)Cukurova Region of Turkey
(3)Nile Valley and Delta of Egypt
(4)Bali Island of Indonesia
(5)South Sulawesi or Sumatra Islands of Indonesia
(6)Echigawa Region of Japan
(7)Zhanghe Region of China

4. Research Plan研究の展開

This research project will contribute to the design of place-specific water policies and practices and to the concepts, models and theories that describe the multi-scale and linked nature of human-ecological systems. The case studies are designed to illuminate challenges in specific social and environmental contexts; at the same time the emphasis on scale and place integration should contribute to IWRM wherever it is applied. The project is therefore of relevance to local communities, decision makers, and international donor and aid organizations.