Adaptation of water resources management to climate change

have to recognise that they have much to learn and that they should remain open and responsiveto change.Adapting to climate change will require strengthening people’s ability to learn together. Thiswill involve training and may often require the use of new tools. For instance, to inform a multistakeholderprocess on water management options, different scenarios can be presented using adecision support system. Given the uncertainty of future climates in specific basins, actors willwant to use a range of scenarios to test the sensitivity and vulnerabilities of specific sectors or ofthe entire system. This will enable stakeholders to go through a process of “self-discovery”.Experiences across cultures have shown that using new tools is often the only way for people tochange their basic attitudes. Using innovative and appropriate tools will be essential to have peoplestep out of their current mindset and behaviour patterns and begin engaging in adaptation toclimate change.4.4 Managing Conflicts Over Uncertain and Troubled WatersWater resource disputes occur throughout the world. In the future, increased climate variabilityand change are likely to lead to an augmentation in the occurrence, intensity, public profile andcomplexity of such disputes. Public and private water policies and planning have, however, paidrelatively little attention to the management of water conflicts, even though the existence ofconflicting claims over water resources and related land resources is a clear obstacle to sustainablewater management. Further increases in water demand and threats derived from climate variabilityand change will make it increasingly important to find new mechanisms and institutions anddevelop the required skills to manage conflicts over water resources.“SPECIAL ATTENTION NEEDS TO BE GIVEN TO MANAGING BOTHEXISTING AND EMERGING WATER CONFLICTS.”Policies and measures related to climate change, including those dealing with adaptation, canthemselves lead to increased conflict. Defining and demarcating high flood-risk zones along riverscan, for example, lead to tensions between administrators and land and property owners. Likewise,the allocation of water to maintain downstream river areas and wetlands can generate tensionsamong water users. In over-allocated river basin systems in particular, the conflicts arising fromnew policies and plans to adapt to climate change might give rise to new tensions or intensifyexisting conflicts. In such circumstances, the adaptation process can even bring conflicts out intothe open that have been hidden for decades if not centuries.Special attention needs to be given to managing both existing and emerging water conflicts.Natural resources conflict management, including water and land dispute management, is a processrather than a specific package of standard procedures and solutions. In all cases it has to deal withresource scarcity and the contested allocation of resources. In some settings, resources are usedby people in ways that are defined symbolically. 35 Waterways and fish are not simply resourcespeople compete over; they are part of a particular way of life. These symbols and identities arehighly significant in an ideological, historic, social, economic and political sense. Managing conflictsover water and land requires acknowledging and building on this reality to find solutions acceptableto all stakeholders.35