Equity in Water Management
EPA Grant Number: F6C30154Title: Equity in Water Management
Investigators: Balazs, Carolina
Institution: University of California - Berkeley
EPA Project Officer: Cobbs, Gladys M.
Project Period: September 1, 2006 through September 1, 2009
Project Amount: $107,782
RFA: STAR Graduate Fellowships (2006)
Research Category: Academic Fellowships , Pollution Prevention/Sustainable Development , Fellowship - Water Resource Management
Description:
Objective:My research will focus on the Rio Preto Basin, in the Central-Eastern portion of Brazil. The rationale for my research is to better understand how a melding of integrated water resource management and sustainable livelihood frameworks can address environmental and social needs in watershed and water resource planning. My research will address the following questions:
- What is the potential of using water management and planning models to explicitly integrate goals of sustainable livelihoods into IWRM?
- What are the social, ecological and economic outcomes of a water management model that explicitly incorporates such goals?
- How do socially-focused outcomes compare to business-as-usual scenarios and scenarios that consider only environmental needs?
- Extend the application of water management modeling as a decision-making tool that incorporates questions of social equity, defined as meeting sustainable livelihoods.
- Evaluate and analyze a series of water policies that policy makers and water users could face.
I will build an integrated water resource management model that allows me to input hydrologic and socioeconomic data so as to test different scenarios and analyze outcomes.
Expected Results:The comparison of various water use scenarios alongside different water policies will result in a decision-making tool that can highlight how best to meet the needs of the poor and marginalized communities, while still considering water efficiency and environmentally sustainability.
Supplemental Keywords:integrated water resource management, sustainable livelihoods, equity,
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Water, Scientific Discipline, RFA, Water & Watershed, Watersheds, Ecology and Ecosystems, Environmental Monitoring, alternative urbanization scenarios, socioeconomics, ecosystem modeling, ecology assessment models, availability of water resources, watershed sustainablility, water management options, water resources