Here is an essay on ‘Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM)’ for class 9, 10, 11 and 12. Find paragraphs, long and short essays on ‘Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM)’ especially written for school and college students.
Essay on IWRM
Essay Contents:
- Essay on the Meaning of IWRM
- Essay on the Principles of IWRM
- Essay on the Framework of IWRM
- Essay on the Need for IWRM
- Essay on the Key Issues in Water Management
- Essay on the Water Governance by IWRM
- Essay on the Institution Involved in IWRM
Essay # 1. Meaning of IWRM:
The IWRM (Integrated Water Management – IWM) involves ‘the coordinated planning and management of land, water and other environmental resources for their equitable, efficient and suitable use’.
Integrated water management (IWM)/Integrated water resources management (IWRM) is ‘a process which promotes the coordinated development and management of water, land and related resources in order to maximise the resultant economic and social welfare in an equitable manner without compromising the sustainability of vital ecosystems’.
The IWRM is ‘a systemic process for the sustainable development, allocation and monitoring of water resources use in the context of economic and environmental objectives’.
The beginning of the present IWRM paradigm can be traced to few centuries back. In Spain, multi-stakeholders, participatory water tribunals have operated since tenth century and probably Spain is the first country to start managing water resources at a basin level. However, the widespread and systematic application of IWRM principles with more comprehensive approach is a recent phenomenon.
First coordinated approach to IWRM was evolved at UN Conference on Water held at Mar del Plata (Argentina) in 1977. Later, Global Consultation on Safe Water and Sanitation was held in New Delhi during 1990. The Dublin Conference on Water and Environment of 1992 and UN Conference Environment and Development of 1992 held at Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) put together a comprehensive water resources management approach for sustainable development.
Essay # 2. Principles of IWRM:
During the Rio conference, the concepts of Integrated Water Resources Management were widely discussed and accepted.
The IWRM is based on four principles – the Dublin Principles:
1. Fresh water is a finite and vulnerable resource, essential to sustain life, development and the environment.
Water sustains life in all its forms and is required for many different purposes, functions and services. Holistic management, therefore, has to involve consideration of the demands placed on the resources and the threats to it. Holistic management not only involves the management of natural systems; it also necessitates coordination between the range of human activities which create the demands for water, determine land uses and generate water borne waste products.
Creating water sensitive political economy requires coordinated policy making at all levels (from national ministries to local government or community – based institutions). There is also a need for mechanisms which ensure that economic sector decision makers take water costs and sustainability into account when making production and consumption choices. Development of such an institutional framework capable of integrating human systems – economic, social and political – represents a considerable challenge.
2. Water development and management should be based on a participatory approach, involving users, planners and policy makers at all levels.
Fresh water is a finite and vulnerable resource, essential to sustain life, development and the environment.
Water is a subject in which everyone is a stakeholder. Real participation only takes place when stakeholders are part of the decision making process. This can occur directly when local communities come together to make water supply, management and use choices.
Participation also occurs if democratically elected or otherwise accountable agencies or spokespersons can represent stakeholder groups. The type of participation will depend upon the spatial scale relevant to particular water management and investment decisions and upon the nature of the political economy in which such decisions take place.
3. Women play a central part in the provision, management and safeguarding of water.
It is widely acknowledged that women play a key role in the collection and safeguarding of water for domestic and – in many cases – agricultural use, but they have a much less influential role than men in management, problem analysis and in the decision making process related to water resources.
Addressing gender as a cross-cutting goal requires that women’s views, interests and needs shape the development agenda as much as men’s and that the development agenda support progress towards more equal relations between women and men. Gender needs should be part of the overall policy framework which can ensure that policies, programmes and projects address the differences in experiences and situations between and among women and men.
Equal participation in social and political issues involves women’s equal right to articulate their needs and interests, as well as their vision of society and to shape the decisions that affect their lives. Their ability to do this can be strengthened through community organisations and institutions and building participatory capacity.
4. Water has an economic value in all its competing uses should be recognised as an economic good.
Within this principle, it is vital to recognise first the basic right of all human beings to have access to clean water and sanitation at an affordable price. Past failure to recognise the economic value of water has led to wasteful and environmentally damaging uses of the resource.
Managing water as an economic good is an important way of achieving efficient and equitable use and of encouraging conservation and protection of water resources. Value and charges are two different things. The value of water in alternative uses is important for the rational allocation of water as a scarce resource, whether by regulatory or economic means.
Charging (or not charging) for water is applying an economic instrument to support disadvantaged groups, affect behaviour towards conservation and efficient water usage, provide incentives for demand management, ensure cost recovery and signal consumers willingness to pay for additional investments in water services.
Essay # 3. Framework of IWRM:
Integrated water resources management is based on the perception of water as an integral part of the ecosystem, a natural resource and a social and economic good, whose quantity and quality determine the nature of its utilisation.
The IWRM framework consists of three E’s:
a. Economic efficiency,
b. Social equity and
c. Ecosystem sustainability.
a. Economic efficiency in water use:
Because of the increasing scarcity of water and financial resources, the finite and vulnerable nature of water as a resource and the increasing demands upon it, water must be used with maximum possible efficiency
b. Equity:
The basic right for all people to have access to water of adequate quantity and quality for the sustenance of human well-being must be universally recognized.
c. Environmental and ecological sustainability:
“The present use of the resource should be managed in a way that does not undermine the life-support system thereby compromising use by future generations of the same resource.”
Associated key concepts:
1. Integrated water resources management, implying:
i. An inter-sectoral approach
ii. Representation of all stakeholders
iii. Consideration of all physical aspects of the water resources
iv. Considerations of sustainability and the environment
2. Sustainable development, sound socio-economic development that safeguards the resource base for future generations
3. Emphasis on demand driven and demand oriented approaches
4. Decision-making at the lowest possible level (subsidiary).
Essay # 4. Need for IWRM?
Water is vital for human survival, health and dignity and a fundamental resource for human development. The world’s freshwater resources are under increasing pressure yet many still lack access to adequate water supply for basic needs. Growth in population, increased economic activity and improved standards of living lead to increased competition for the limited fresh water resource.
Here are a few reasons why many people argue that the world faces impending water crisis:
1. Water resources are increasingly under pressure from population growth, economic activity and intensifying competition for the water among users
2. Water withdrawals have increased more than twice as fast as population growth and currently one third of the world’s population live in countries that experience medium to high water stress
3. Pollution is further enhancing water scarcity by reducing water usability downstream
4. Shortcomings in the management of water, a focus on developing new sources rather than managing existing ones better and top-down sector approaches to water management result in uncoordinated development and management of the resource
5. More and more development means greater impacts on the environment
6. Current concerns about climate variability and climate change demand improved management of water resources to cope with more intense floods and droughts.
Essay # 5. Key Issues in Water Management:
Key issues in water management are briefly presented:
i. Water Governance Crisis:
Sectoral approaches to water resources management have dominated in the past and are still prevailing. This leads to fragmented and uncoordinated development and management of the resource. Moreover, water management is usually in the hands of top- down institutions, the legitimacy and effectiveness of which have increasingly been questioned. Thus, weak governance aggravates increased competition for the finite resource. IWRM brings coordination and collaboration among the individual sectors, plus a fostering of stakeholder participation, transparency and cost-effective local management.
ii. Securing Water for People:
Although most countries give first priority to satisfying basic human needs for water, one-fifth of the world’s population is without access to safe drinking water and half of the population is without access to adequate sanitation.
These service deficiencies primarily affect the poorest segments of the population in developing countries. In these countries, meeting water supply and sanitation needs for urban and rural areas represents one of the most serious challenges in the years ahead.
iii. Securing Water for Food Production:
Water is increasingly seen as a key constraint on food production, equivalent to if not more crucial than land scarcity. Irrigated agriculture is already responsible for more than 70 per cent of all water withdrawals. Even with an estimated need for an additional 15-20 per cent of irrigation water over the next 25 years-which is probably on the low side- serious conflicts are likely to arise between water for irrigated agriculture and water for other human and ecosystem uses.
IWRM offers the prospect of greater efficiencies, water conservation and demand management equitably shared among water users and of increased recycling and reuse of wastewater to supplement new resource development.
iv. Protecting Vital Ecosystems:
Terrestrial ecosystems in the upstream areas of a basin are important for rainwater infiltration, groundwater recharge and river flow regimes. Aquatic ecosystems produce a range of economic benefits, including such products as timber, fuel wood and medicinal plants and they also provide wildlife habitats and spawning grounds. The ecosystems depend on water flows, seasonality and water table fluctuations and are threatened by poor water quality.
Land and water resources management must ensure that vital ecosystems are maintained and that adverse effects on other natural resources are considered and where possible reduced when development and management decisions are made. IWRM can help to safeguard an “environmental reserve” of water commensurate with the value of ecosystems to human development.
v. Gender Disparities:
Formal water management is male dominated. Though their numbers are starting to grow, the representation of women in water sector institutions is still very low. That is important because the way that water resources are managed affects women and men differently. As custodians of family health and hygiene and providers of domestic water and food, women are the primary stakeholders in household water and sanitation.
Yet, decisions on water supply and sanitation technologies, locations of water points and operation and maintenance systems are mostly made by men. A crucial element of the IWRM philosophy is that water users, rich and poor, male and female, are able to influence decisions that affect their daily lives.
Essay # 6. Water Governance by IWRM:
Effective water governance is the foremost requirement of IWRM as it helps all water users to meet out their basic needs for water and sanitation, farming, animal husbandry, fish production industry, hydro-power etc.
Water governance refers to arrange of political, “social, economic and administrative systems that are in place to develop and manage water resources and the delivery of water services at different levels of society (Global Water Partnership 2002).
Water governance is the exercise of economic, political and administrative authority to manage countries affairs at all levels …. It comprises the mechanism, process and institutions through which citizens and groups articulate their interests, exercise their legal rights, meet their obligations and mediate their differences (UNDP 2001).
Constraints to Water Governance:
The following are the major constraints to governance: 1. Inadequate policies and legislation
2. Over-sized bureaucracies with low productivity and accountability
3. Highly fragmented and sectorised agencies
4. More number of agencies with poor coordination
5. Insufficient water budget and its poor mobilisation
6. Poor data base
7. Lack of capacity building
8. Inappropriate awareness among stakeholders.
Main Challenges of Effective Governance:
Main challenges of effective governance include: 1. Equitable allocation of water between sectors within river basins
2. To enable agreement incentives and accountability arrangements among stakeholders to work towards agreed objectives and procedures for sustainable and productive management of water
3. Improving productivity and equity of water in irrigation system
4. Optimising and mobilising funds in order to ensure sustainability or irrigation system
5. Optimising the use of aquifers and groundwater resources
6. Adopting new self governing local institutions, incentives and accountability mechanisms that compel numerous and scattered pump operators to adopt sustainable practices of groundwater extraction.
Principles of Effective Water Governance:
Global Water Partnership (2000) suggested the following basic principles of effective water governance:
1. Institution involved in IWRM should have clear objectives
2. Institution should work in an open and transparent manner
3. Information should be communicated using language that is accessible and understandable to the general public
4. Transparency in policy decisions
5. New policies and legislation should be framed on the basis of demand, objective and past experience
6. Institutional and functional and decision making should be accountable stakeholders
7. Equity between and among various interest groups, stakeholders among consumer voters needs to be carefully monitored
8. Institutions must take responsibility for their decisions and actions
9. Water governance needs to take into account future water users as well.
Benefits of Effective Water Governance:
Benefits of effective water governance include:
1. Improved water productivity and water use efficiency
2. Equitable distribution of water among different users
3. High environmental security
4. Better conservation of fragile ecosystem in watersheds and river basins,
5. High agricultural production
6. Preservation of aquifers, groundwater and surface water resources
7. Better recycling and use of wastewater
8. Improved health of poor in river basins
9. More adequate mobilisation of funds to pay for IWR
10. Improved net income for farming communities.
Essay # 7
. Institution Involved in IWRM:
The following institutions are involved in IWRM:
1. National government
2. Ministers of the government
3. Departments of water supply and sanitation, irrigation, agriculture, energy, health, finance, transport, fisheries, environment, tourism and others as relevant
4. Water utilities and agencies
5. River basin organisations
6. Water users associations (WUA)
7. Community based organisations such as watershed committee, forest protection committees and self help groups (SHG’s)
8. Civil society organisations (NGOs).
i. Organisations Promoting IWRM:
The following international organisations are engaged in promoting water resource management:
1. Global Water Partnership (GWP)
2. United Nations Organisations (UNO)
3. United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)
4. IUNC-The World Conservation Union (IUNC-WCU)
5. Associated Programme for Food Management (WMO and GWP)
6. International Network of Basin Organisation (INBO),
7. United States Agency for International Development (USAID)
8. World Wildlife Fund (WWF)
9. World Bank (WB)
10. Asian Development Bank (ADB).
ii. IWRM Research Organisations:
Major organisations engaged in IWRM are:
1. International Water Management Institute, (IWMI), Colombo, Sri Lanka
2. CGIAR Challenge Programme on Water and Food (CGIAR-CPWF), Sri Lanka
3. International Water and Sanitation Center (IWSC), Hague, Netherlands
4. Hydrology for the Environment Life and Policy (HELP), Paris, France.