The political nexus between water and economics in Brazil:A critique of recent policy reforms

The reform of water policies in Brazil has involved a combination of regulatory norms and economic-incentive instruments. Nonetheless, contrary to its formal objectives, the process has largely failed to prevent widespread environmental impacts and growing spatial and sectoral conflicts. The main reason for such failures is the perverse influence of market rationality, which is particularly evident in the reorganization of the public sector, the quantification of the monetary value of water, and the payment for environmental services

Can water institutions be cured? A water institutions health index

Once we agree that appropriate institutional arrangements play an important role in explaining the level of performance of the water sector across countries, we still face the overwhelming role of defining, measuring and comparing institutional performance. Unfortunately, water institutions in many countries are dated and weak. While the evaluation of water institutions is critical to identifying the gaps between needed and actual arrangements, and consequently deriving reform strategies, methodological issues and data problems present major challenges for such comparisons. This paper develops the Water Institution Health Index, based on a set of legal, policy, and organizational variables identified from an institutional decomposition approach. The index is constructed for 43 countries based on an international sample of 127 water experts; it evaluates and compares the relative health of water institutions and their components across these countries, and demonstrates the linkage and consistency of this index with other economic, social and governance indicators.</jats:p

Urban households’ access to water for livelihoods enhancement in Accra, Ghana

This paper presents the results of research conducted in Accra, Ghana, aimed at understanding how access to water allows small-scale, water dependent livelihoods to contribute to the household income of urban and peri-urban communities. Ten communities were selected in Accra and its surrounding communities to reflect different levels of infrastructure provision and conditions of water supply. Focus group discussions were held in each community. Issues which emerged were investigated further in a structured household questionnaire survey involving 443 respondents. A wide range of small-scale water dependent occupations were observed. Among the households surveyed, 59.14% were engaged in a water dependent occupation which contributed over 80% of household income in some cases. Small-scale, water dependent occupations, thus, constitute an important source of income for urban and peri-urban households

Water rights: a comparison of the impacts of urban and irrigation reforms in Australia

Although there has been a policy thrust towards making all Australians more cognisant of the relative scarcity of water resources, the approach adopted for urban dwellers differs markedly from that applied to irrigators. These differences are examined from a property-rights perspective focussing primarily on the institutional hierarchies in the Victorian water sector. The analysis reveals significant attenuation of urban dwellers' rights, presumably on the basis of the information deficiencies that circumscribe urban water use. Alternative policy options are then proposed, which might alleviate some of these information deficiencies and simultaneously address the efficiency losses that attend the present arrangements. Copyright Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society Inc. and Blackwell Publishing Ltd 2006.