Water Markets in Spain: Performance and Challenges

Law 46/1999 incorporated formal water markets into the Spanish legal and regulatory framework, allowing spot water markets and the creation of water banks. The implementation of water markets in Spain aimed at improving the efficiency of water use by reallocating water towards uses with higher added value. However, the performance of water markets in Spain has been rather disappointing, since they have been operative only during drought periods, and even under these extreme scarcity situations, trading activity counted for less than 5.0% of total water use. The narrowness of the market suggests that there are some barriers hampering their effective functioning. This paper examines the evolution and performance of water markets in Spain, relying on a transaction costs analysis framework. This analysis allows the identification of the main factors impeding water markets from operating effectively as a water reallocation tool. This analysis also provides some guidelines on how to overcome these obstacles and, thus, how to improve the efficiency of water use

El papel de los mercados como instrumento para la reasignación del agua en España

Most of the river basins in Spain are currently in a “mature water economy” phase, characterised by a high and rising water demand and a limited long-run supply. One of the main consequences of this situation is the “closure” of the river basins in Southern Spain, defined as those basins with a relatively small amount of uncommitted run-off. These facts have lead to necessary shifts in the water policies implemented, moving from supply-side to demand-side oriented measures, water markets being one of the key economic instruments within this new policy approach. Water markets were legally approved in Spain in 1999. Their purpose was to minimize the negative effects derived from the “water maturity” situation by promoting a more efficient use of the scarce water resources through their reallocation from low to high-value uses. The objective of this paper is to assess the role that water markets have performed in Spain as an instrument for water reallocation. To do this, exhaustive data gathering about water market activity (agents involved, amount of water traded, prices paid, etc.) has been carried out. This information has allowed us to conduct a full analysis of the overall experience of formal water markets in Spain since they were approved in 1999. The main conclusions resulting from the study are: a) water markets have mainly been used to deal with water scarcity during drought periods (most of the operations reported were carried out from 2006 to 2009), urban and high-value agriculture users in south-eastern Spain acting as buyers and low-value agriculture users in inner Spain as sellers; b) water market activity has been characterized by its narrowness (a scant number of operations and participants on both sides of the market); c) high volumes of water traded in each operation because of the high transactions costs; d) water market activity registered in south-eastern basins is quite similar to those registered in USA states were water markets are already operating (California, Colorado or Texas), representing around 5% of the total water demand during drought periods; e) a further development of water market activity is expected in the next decade as happened in Australia, where water markets currently represent about the 20% of total water demand during drought periods. Finally, it is worth mentioning that a complete and comprehensive assessment of water market performance in Spain is still required in order to accurately assess the economic, social and environmental impacts of this economic instrument. Only by doing so legal and institutional changes could be rationally proposedLa mayor parte de las cuencas hidrográficas de España se encuentra actualmente en una fase de madurez de la economía del agua, caracterizada por una demanda alta y creciente del recurso y una oferta limitada a largo plazo, situación que está provocando el “cierre” de la mayor parte de las cuencas del sur y el este peninsular. Con la introducción de los mercados de agua se ha tratado de paliar los efectos derivados de esta situación, potenciando un uso más eficiente del recurso. En este trabajo se lleva a cabo un análisis de las experiencias de mercado que han tenido lugar en nuestro país desde su implantación. A pesar del escaso número de operaciones registradas, el volumen de agua intercambiado a través de las mismas ha sido relativamente cuantioso, permitiendo solventar parcialmente los problemas asociados a la escasez de recursos hídricos durante el periodo de sequía de los años 2005-2009

Economics of Water Security

In the immediate future, accessible runoff of fresh water is unlikely to increase more than the demand forecasted. It will have an impact on economic growth as it may reduce the per capita income of countries and create water conflicts. Such global threat creates a policy conundrum of how to meet basic needs and maximise the benefits from water resources. This chapter investigates different economic instruments in alleviating water-related risks and dealt with associated impacts.Anik Bhaduri, C. Dionisio Pérez-Blanco, Dolores Rey, Sayed Iftekhar, Aditya Kaushik, Alvar Escriva-Bou, Javier Calatrava, David Adamson, Sara Palomo-Hierro, Kelly Jones, Heidi Asbjornsen, Mónica A. Altamirano, Elena Lopez-Gunn, Maksym Polyakov, Mahsa Motlagh, and Maksud Bekchano

El papel de los mercados como instrumento para la reasignación del agua en España

Most of the river basins in Spain are currently in a “mature water economy” phase, characterised by a high and rising water demand and a limited long-run supply. One of the main consequences of this situation is the “closure” of the river basins in Southern Spain, defined as those basins with a relatively small amount of uncommitted run-off. These facts have lead to necessary shifts in the water policies implemented, moving from supply-side to demand-side oriented measures, water markets being one of the key economic instruments within this new policy approach. Water markets were legally approved in Spain in 1999. Their purpose was to minimize the negative effects derived from the “water maturity” situation by promoting a more efficient use of the scarce water resources through their reallocation from low to high-value uses. The objective of this paper is to assess the role that water markets have performed in Spain as an instrument for water reallocation. To do this, exhaustive data gathering about water market activity (agents involved, amount of water traded, prices paid, etc.) has been carried out. This information has allowed us to conduct a full analysis of the overall experience of formal water markets in Spain since they were approved in 1999. The main conclusions resulting from the study are: a) water markets have mainly been used to deal with water scarcity during drought periods (most of the operations reported were carried out from 2006 to 2009), urban and high-value agriculture users in south-eastern Spain acting as buyers and low-value agriculture users in inner Spain as sellers; b) water market activity has been characterized by its narrowness (a scant number of operations and participants on both sides of the market); c) high volumes of water traded in each operation because of the high transactions costs; d) water market activity registered in south-eastern basins is quite similar to those registered in USA states were water markets are already operating (California, Colorado or Texas), representing around 5% of the total water demand during drought periods; e) a further development of water market activity is expected in the next decade as happened in Australia, where water markets currently represent about the 20% of total water demand during drought periods. Finally, it is worth mentioning that a complete and comprehensive assessment of water market performance in Spain is still required in order to accurately assess the economic, social and environmental impacts of this economic instrument. Only by doing so legal and institutional changes could be rationally proposedLa mayor parte de las cuencas hidrográficas de España se encuentra actualmente en una fase de madurez de la economía del agua, caracterizada por una demanda alta y creciente del recurso y una oferta limitada a largo plazo, situación que está provocando el “cierre” de la mayor parte de las cuencas del sur y el este peninsular. Con la introducción de los mercados de agua se ha tratado de paliar los efectos derivados de esta situación, potenciando un uso más eficiente del recurso. En este trabajo se lleva a cabo un análisis de las experiencias de mercado que han tenido lugar en nuestro país desde su implantación. A pesar del escaso número de operaciones registradas, el volumen de agua intercambiado a través de las mismas ha sido relativamente cuantioso, permitiendo solventar parcialmente los problemas asociados a la escasez de recursos hídricos durante el periodo de sequía de los años 2005-2009

Mercados de agua en Australia y California. Que podemos aprender de ellos?

Sara Palomo-Hierro, Claire Settre, Adam Loch, Sarah Ann Wheele

Using Peer Review for Student Performance Enhancement: Experiences in a Multidisciplinary Higher Education Setting

Nowadays one of the main focuses of the Spanish University system is achieving the active learning paradigm in the context of its integration into the European Higher Education Area. This goal is being addressed by means of the application of novel teaching mechanisms. Among a wide variety of learning approaches, the present work focuses on peer review, understood as a collaborative learning technique where students assess other student’s work and provide their own feedback. In this way, peer review has the overarching goal of improving the student learning during this process. Peer review has been successfully applied and analyzed in the literature. Indeed, many authors also recommend improving the design and implementation of self and peer review, which has been our main goal. This paper presents an empirical study based on the application of peer review assessment in different higher education BSc and MSc courses. In this way, six courses from different studies at the University of Malaga in Spain are subject to the application of peer review strategies to promote student learning and develop cross-wise skills such as critical thinking, autonomy and responsibility. Based on these experiences, a deep analysis of the results is performed, showing that a proper application of the peer review methodology provides reliable reviews (with close scores to the ones from the teacher) as well as an improvement in the students’ performance

Objectively assessed physical activity levels in spanish cancer survivors

PURPOSE/OBJECTIVES: To objectively assess physical activity (PA) levels in a cohort of Spanish cancer survivors. DESIGN: Descriptive, cross-sectional. SETTING: The Hospital Universitario de Fuenlabrada and two healthcare centers in Madrid, Spain. SAMPLE: 204 cancer survivors and 115 adults with no history of cancer. METHODS: Participants wore a triaxial accelerometer for seven or more consecutive days to assess PA levels. Body mass index (BMI), indirect indicators of adiposity (waist circumference, waist-to-hip ratio), and cardiorespiratory fitness also were determined. CONCLUSIONS: Although cancer survivors overall met international PA recommendations for a healthy lifestyle, their BMI and cardiorespiratory profiles were not within the healthy range.2.788 JCR (2014) Q1, 2/110 Nursing; Q3, 109/211 OncologyUE