The Conservation and Sustainable Use of Freshwater ... - IUCN

food, and trade are global in character, and hence, must be
viewed and resolved within a global framework combined
with regional and national water policies and plans of actions.
The conventional way for assessing water situations
normally is based on a national or country level. This
limited view does not take into consideration regional and
global interactions in terms of water transfer (whether it is
“blue” or “green” water) through trade in the form of food
imports.
The reason for rethinking the conventional way (water
balance per country) of water management is the emergence
of a global economy. The crucial challenge for water
professionals in the future is how to induce a paradigm
shift in the conventional modes of water sector planning
to new modes of thinking that take into account the globe
and/or the region as a unit of analysis rather than the nationstate.
At a regional level, there is a need to establish synergies
between water, food, and trade to achieve water and
food security. The WESCANA region represents a critical
mass and a logical unit of analysis for water assessment
and management. Complementarities among nation-states
in water, food, and trade represent comparative advantages
and economies of scale for each nation-state. Ecological
and political borders rarely coincide. Few serious environmental
problems can be solved within the framework
of the nation-state. Some problems are bilateral, some are
global, and quite a few are regional. The latter are often
related to water: coastal waters, rivers, and groundwater.
The fact that regional management programs exist and persist,
in spite of nationalist rivalries, shows the imperative
need for environmental cooperation.
Research Question
A fundamental question that this paper aims to address is:
Is there enough water in the WESCANA region?
It is argued that at the global level, all means of subsistence
(water, food, and energy) are in abundance. The
perceived water crisis is a matter of allocations and distribution.
It is interesting to note that all water balances
and calculations of water deficits are on a national basis
(each country is treated as a separate entity). No regional
assessments of water balances were conducted to combine
the dynamics of the three interconnected components, i.e.
water, food, and trade. Hence, any strategic effort to view,
think, and implement sustainable water strategies in the
WESCANA region, should consider the following:
a) Water is an economic good, which should be allocated
to its best use based on technical, economic, and environmental
criteria. Water balances should be assessed
with a broader context, such as an ecosystem, river basin,
or watershed area. Assessment should consider the
interactions between “blue” and “green” water.
b) Food security must be viewed and assessed in both regional
and global frameworks by linking water, food,
and trade policies.
c) Global trade of cereals, fruit, and vegetables represents
a form of virtual water that alleviates water shortages at
the national level.
Situation Analysis:
Pressure - Response Analysis
In light of the IUCN vision for water and nature, IUCN
envisions the WESCANA region as one where environmental
security is guaranteed because everyone values and
accepts personal responsibility for the conservation and
wise use of freshwater and related ecosystems.
The maintenance of environmental security is based on
integrated management of all land and water use through
an ecosystem-based approach within river and drainage basins,
including their associated marine and coastal zones.
Also, it is a region in which social security is strengthened
by providing everyone with equitable access to and responsibility
for safe and sufficient water resources to meet
their needs and rights, by means that maintain the integrity
of freshwater and related ecosystems. It is a world where
ecosystems are managed and used in a fair and equitable
manner for economic security. This will include economic
valuation of water resources
Environmental degradation inevitably leads to a decline
in social and economic security. Loss of social and economic
security, in turn, causes environmental degradation
to continue, initiating a downward spiral of environmental
degradation, poverty, and social disruption. Understanding
and accepting the mutual dependence between people
and ecosystems form the point of departure for changing
the ways that we manage water resources in the future.
The human-water-nature interactions may be depicted in a
pressure-impact-response model of water resources degradation
as outlined below.
Important drivers and a description of pressure-impactresponse
for water/environmental issues reveal the following:
• The unsustainable rise in population and booming economic
growth have led to increased natural resource
consumption, social inequity, and poverty.
• Increases in the demand for water resources impose
pressure on the ecosystems that provide this resource,
through resource overexploitation, environmentally
disruptive infrastructure development, and water pollution.
• This continues to lead to the dramatic decline of the
state of many of the region’s ecosystems. Wetlands
and aquatic habitats have disappeared, and the quantity
and quality of many surface- and ground-water systems
are reduced and seriously degraded. People are more
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