Water Resources Allocation and Agriculture: Transitioning from Open to Regulated Access
The book brings together a range of leading scholars and practitioners to compile an international account of water allocation policies supporting a transition to sustainable water use in regions where agriculture is the dominant water use. In Section 1, the collection canvasses five key cross-cutting issues shaping the challenge of sustainable water allocation policy, such as legal and economic perspectives, the role of politics, the setting of environmental flows, and the importance of indigenous rights. Section 2 presents 13 national, state and transboundary case studies of water allocation policy, covering cases from Europe, the Americas, Central Asia, the Middle East and the Pacific region. These case studies highlight novel and innovative elements of water allocation regimes, which respond to the cross-cutting issues addressed in Section 1, as well as local challenges and social and environmental imperatives. The book provides a comprehensive account of water allocation in a range of international settings and provides a reference point for practitioners and scholars worldwide wishing to draw on the latest advances on how to design and implement sustainable water allocation systems.
ISBN: 9781789062779 (print)
ISBN: 9781789062786 (eBook)
ISBN: 9781789062793 (ePUB)
Chapter 4: Indigenous water and Mother Earth
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Published:August 2022
Margot A. Hurlbert, 2022. "Indigenous water and Mother Earth", Water Resources Allocation and Agriculture: Transitioning from Open to Regulated Access, Josselin Rouillard, Christina Babbitt, Edward Challies, Jean-Daniel Rinaudo
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Abstract
This chapter reviews Indigenous water law in Canada and the United States, highlighting the protection of Indigenous rights and their priority in law, even though the historical practice has often excluded or denied them. Through treaties, court cases, and advancing laws respecting Mother Earth, the worldviews and values of Indigenous relations and Buen Vivir inform and mediate water management solutions and competing claims, overexploitation, and water conflict. New legal developments including the rights of nature, protecting them in constitutions, and recognizing river rights in laws in Central and South America, the United States and New Zealand move law, practice and water governance closer to a fairer and more socially just sharing of water resources between Indigenous communities and competing water claims including irrigated agriculture. Addressing water challenges of the 21st century will require innovative solutions and approaches to water management. Including and giving full voice to Indigenous people and their water laws and practices is a necessity both in law and water management practice.