Abstract:Water scarcity problems are becoming increasingly common due to higher water demand, urbanization, economic development and climatic variability. Policies and measures based on Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) are often advocated to tackle the problems of competing demands and conflicts among stakeholders. Demand management measures as part of the IWRM package are expected to offset the increased demands on water resources caused by economic growth. However, even if IWRM-based policies are in place, the potential impacts of demand management are seldom quantified while formulating water policies or development plans. To address this, we conducted scenario analysis using Water Evaluation and Planning System (WEAP21) in a case study from the Awash Basin in Ethiopia. We show that ambitious irrigation expansion plans to combat food insecurity will lead to overexploitation of water resources with increasing inequity between smallholders and commercial farmers. Demand management measures proposed by water users are insufficient to offset these consequences. Potential demand measures that are embedded in the IWRM-based policies alone are also insufficient. While water policies emphasize IWRM principles but do not indicate how to properly implement them, economic development plans are often launched without adequately considering equity and environment, two of the three pillars of IWRM. This scenario analysis shows the importance of quantitative information in IWRM formulation and monitoring.

This paper focuses on sub-theme one: An Enabling Policy Environment for Water, Food and Energy Security. It discusses water food and energy (WFE) security and their interrelations as the background for policy discourse and introduces the WFE nexus and its quantification by modelling as one of the tools for developing a broader approach to resources management.

Environmental flows allocation is an intrinsic part of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM). This paper analyses socio‐political issues and effects of environmental flows integration on water availability under the context of increased agricultural intensification in an effort to tackle food insecurity. Lack of appropriate framework comprising the procedural requirements and strategic directions as well as prevalence of politically motivated ad hoc development programmes are among major challenges identified. Introducing environmental flows to a perceived satisfactory level would result in a significant increase of unmet irrigation water demand, yet, “productivity first” norm overtakes. This is presumed to be due to skewed focus on irrigation expansion and low awareness on the possible consequences. The particular challenges highlighted generally unveil the inherent contradictions in the IWRM concept putting its claim that the set of principles and entire course stand universally accepted as a means to balance socio‐economic and environmental outcomes under question.

Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) has been a dominant paradigm for water sector reform worldwide over the past two decades. Ethiopia, among early adopters, has developed a water policy, legislations, and strategy per IWRM core principles. However, considerable constraints are still in its way of realization. This paper investigates the central challenges facing IWRM implementation in the Awash Basin analyzing the discrepancy between IWRM principles, the approach followed in Ethiopia and its practice in the Awash Basin. A decade and a half since its adoption, the Ethiopian IWRM still lacks a well-organized and robust legal system for implementation. Unclear and overlapping institutional competencies as well as a low level of stakeholders’ awareness on policy contents and specific mandates of implementing institutions have prevented the Basin Authority from fully exercising its role as the prime institute for basin level water management. As a result, coordination between stakeholders, a central element of the IWRM concept, is lacking. Insufficient management instruments and planning tools for the operational function of IWRM are also among the major hurdles in the process. This calls for rethinking and action on key elements of the IWRM approach to tackle the implementation challenges.