Water, which might appear as a gift from nature, actually needs huge human investment in order to serve the varied and growing global demand on this resource. Creating the investment structures and securing the funding to meet water needs is a key enabling factor to achieving good water governance.
Legal frameworks play an important role in the management of water resources at a range of scales – from local and national legislation covering domestic use, to international treaties that govern waters shared by sovereign nations.
Water is a core developmental issue; it affects almost every activity within the wider economy and society, including migration, land use and settlement growth and changes in industrial activity. Consequently, the developments that do not necessarily relate to the water sector per se – for example national energy and food policies – are yet always closely connected to water. Setting goals on water use, protection and conservation, must be based on policies that take into account these various interconnections.
Management instruments are specific methods that enable decision makers to make rational and informed choices when it comes to water management and to tailor their actions to specific situations. Good water governance, according to IWRM principles brings together perspectives and knowledge from different domains. Consequently, the instruments presented here are based on a variety of disciplines such as hydrology, hydraulics, environmental sciences, system engineering, legal sciences, sociology, and economics.
