Three Streams to a Thriving Future
ADB Review [ December 2006 - January 2007 ]
Rural, urban, and basin water—Will ADB's new
lens for analyzing water projects yield greater results?
By Abby Tan
Consultant Writer for RSID's Cooperation Fund for the Water Sector
If football were played the way most
water resources are managed, the game
would be chaos. Water governance
could learn a thing or two from football.
In football, the game isn't contained to
just one corner of the field or controlled by
one player for very long. No, the game
splices in any given direction, at uneven
paces, and with great unpredictability.
What holds the game together are players
who know their role, know the potential
impact of their move and the rules governing
the game.
Water is like football in that they both—by design—are not easy to contain, yet need
rules to thrive. Water cuts across diverse landscapes, is managed by dozens of different
government ministries, and used by
multiple—often rival—users. It is hard to
call water a "sector" (like football is called
a "game") because its management and
use often lack the rules needed to give it
efficiency and effectiveness. As a result, water
resources have been depleted, polluted,
and unfairly distributed-often leaving the
poor on the sidelines with no services and
the water resources in dismal conditions.
How long can this go on? Rules are exactly
what water in Asia and the Pacific
need. The principles of integrated water
resource management (IWRM) are the
rules—the approach—that leading global
and regional institutions have been advocating
for years. The problem is that
everyone in Asia—or even the majority of
governments—is not playing by them, and,
as a result, is faced with rivers either running too dry, flooded, or polluted to sustain their
economic growth.
IWRM offers governments a solution.
is all about coordination and thinking holistically
to meet the demands from different
sectors and between urban and rural
areas. ADB's Water for All Policy advocates
implementing IWRM in basins specifically,
as they are the foundation for sustainable
use by the various urban and rural users.
Yet, to know how to manage basins, we must
know the water situation in rural and urban
areas.
Internally, ADB has applied a new lens
for studying the current status and direction
of its water operations, and the management
of water resources in the region.
Projects are identified as either rural, urban,
or basin in nature, and ADB project
staff have begun working together in small
groups to identify the specific issues,
trends, barriers, and possible solutions for
rural, urban, and basin water problems.
The following series of articles looks
more closely at exactly what ADB means
by "rural water," "urban water," and "basin
water" and the kinds of projects that characterize
them. The idea behind this threepronged
approach is that an integrated plan
for water can be assembled only when the
mechanics of its parts have been understood.
Only then can Asia's water resources
and urban and rural economies truly have a
chance of thriving.
Know more about ADB's vision for integrated water management in the region
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