African Water Development Report 2006 - United Nations Economic ...

countries in the southern portion of the Basin, i.e. Burundi, D.R. Congo, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda,as well as the downstream riparians, Sudan and Egypt. The EN-SAP and NEL-SAP have established Coordinationoffices in Addis Ababa and in Entebbe, Uganda, respectively. The coordination offices are to prepare actualprojects proposed by the individual countries benefiting two or more basin countries.At this time the Eastern Nile Group is working on advancing projects towards implementation mostly in theEthiopian highlands for the benefit of the sub-basin riparian countries. Projects are also proposed by Sudan andEgypt. The projects proposed by Ethiopia are for the implementation of some of the major planned dams on theBlue Nile, Baro and Tekeze rivers as well as other dams on tributaries of the Blue Nile for irrigation, hydropowerand flood management. The creation of reservoirs on these rivers in Ethiopia will have a significant effect oncontrolling floods and providing controlled flow for Sudan and Egypt. Retention of floods in Ethiopian highlandreservoirs has the additional advantage of reducing evaporation and increasing available water for use by downstreamriparian countries.Source AWDR National Report of EthiopiaEnvironmental Scarcity and SocialConflictsA growing mass of empirical evidence andtheoretical work points to a link between environmentaldegradation or scarcity of naturalresources and social conflicts. The concept of“environmental scarcity,” introduced by the workof Homer-Dixon et al, has proved to be an extremelypowerful tool with which to analyze thechallenges ahead, and is used here to get a conceptualgrip on the risk of conflicts within countriesas a result of water scarcity.Environmental scarcity is defined as the sum(or product) of a particular environmental impact,population increase, and societal inequality.Simply put, the environmental impact (overpumping of aquifers) will make the resource piesmaller, population increase will make the slices(per capita allotments of finite water resources)smaller, and societal inequality will make an inordinatenumber of slices end up in the hands ofthe wealthy, while the less powerful will get fewerslices of the already shrinking pie than they areentitled to (Ohlsson L. 2002).A typical example would be increasing waterscarcity in a farming community from overpumpinggroundwater boreholes or farming onsteep mountainsides. The driving forces wouldbe the environmental impact per se (lowering ofwater-tables or less infiltration of rain into theground). At the same time, demand-inducedscarcity will probably be in operation, stemmingfrom population increase, and possibly also fromincreased affluence and economic activity (morepeople demand more and better food, placingstill greater demands on water resources) (OhlssonL. 2002).In a situation of growing scarcity, the more powerfulsectors within a local society would tendto monopolize access to diminishing water resources(resource capture), leading to marginalizationof poorer segments. Structurally inducedscarcity may be reproduced on a larger societallevel, through competition over water frommore powerful sectors (cities and industries),thus further marginalizing the agricultural sectorin general, and poorer farmers in particular.Marginalized people in turn will tend to sustainthemselves in ways that by necessity rather thanchoice are unsustainable, that is, result in increasedenvironmental impacts. Conflict wouldnot be a predetermined outcome of such a viciouscircle (ibid). Contrary to common wisdom,there is no clear-cut connection between povertyand conflict. For conflict to occur, several conditionsmust be fulfilled, among them that impoverishmentis pervasive to the degree that the legitimacyof the State is threatened. The existenceof ethnic or religious cleavages within a society,acting as a channel for organizing resentment,is a common exacerbating factor. Finding theSHARING WATER FOR REGIONAL INTEGRATION265