• The most classic and most widespread are the ccoonnfflliiccttss ooff uussaaggee (i.e. among users) that originate from the intensification of exploitation of a given surface or groundwater resource system. Well before reaching the maximum possible mobilization of renewable water resources, or even becoming involved in an ‘overexploitation’ in the case of aquifers, increased pumping reduces output and increases production costs, creating competition and tension between old and new users, whether their objectives are similar or, a fortiori, different, especially when the financial means of each are unequal. These conflicts of usage do not arise solely from sharing of scarce water resources but also from competition for access to the least costly and most easily mobilizable resources and those that offer the most security (internal, permanent, good quality water).
These conflicts are naturally aggravated in times of drought which accentuates the water shortages in the regions with predominantly renewable water resource and where the population increase and changing life styles amplifies the vulnerability to drought.
More generally, it is a question of competition between use of natural water resources and recourse to more costly unconventional resources.
• The conflicts of usage occasionally take the form of competition between interfering modes of water mobilization, although it is not immediately perceivable, notably between the exploitation of interdependent groundwater and surface water in the same basin: intensive pumping of ground water may reduce or dry up perennial springs or streams, while surface water regulation by means of dams may decrease or halt the recharge of groundwater by flooding. Both have occurred in the Maghreb, for example. Another form of conflict is due to the difficulties of coexistence between the traditional and modern exploitation processes, for example between the exploitation of groundwater by tapping tunnels with set potential (Foggaras of the Maghreb) and the exploitation by pumping which entails heavy drawdown: the development of more productive
problems and solutions
4
Figure 18. Water resource systems common to several countries in the OSS region
processes enables the increase in mobilized volumes of water and the improvement of the adaptation of water production to demand but it is not compatible with the conservation of old ways in an identical natural resource system, and that may oppose different categories of users.
This problem occurs everywhere where these traditional gravitational modes of exploitation still operate (Oases in Egypt and Libya, the Maghreb and the Sahara).
• On the scale of hydrographical basins, conflicts may occur between upstream and downstream communities. Water works are frequently located upstream and that water is used – or is safer – downstream. The upstream communities may wish to benefit indirectly in the developments. This question is initially posed in the national framework in countries with predominant internal water resources (Type 1, Chap. 1). It obviously has more scope and a geopolitical dimension in the case of border crossing river basins, notably in the countries with predominant external resources where the problem of distribution of resources is acute (Type 2, Chap. 1). These cases are relatively rare in the Maghreb (Guir between Algeria and Morocco, Medjerdah between Algeria and Tunisia) whereas they are more common in the Sahel and in the Nile basin (Fig. 18a), where they are too widely known to be mentioned here.
• The great aquifer systems of the multi-national sedimentary basins1(Fig. 18b) may also give rise to conflicts which nevertheless are only potential at present. In this case, the aim of distribution to be settled is more complex than a flow: it is a matter of distributing, in an equitable manner, the influences, notably in the non-renewable resource development schemes.
• More widely, while remaining in the national frameworks, conflicts between provinces or regions thwart water transport plans which aim at realigning ‘surplus’ or ‘deficit’ regions or basins at the present and in the mid-term and which are already under way or programmed in the Maghreb, Libya, Egypt. Up to what point can water transfer prevail over displacements of activities? How does one compare the advantages of water transfer in the short term for the recipient region and those of resource conservation for a deferred development but calculated greater in the long term for the delivering region? How does one distribute the advantages of transferring: what benefit or what compensation is it necessary to grant to the ‘exporter’ region?
• Another sort of conflict may assume an inter-generational character in the particular cases of management of non-renewable resources (‘mining’ of groundwater) developed notably in Algeria, Tunisia and especially Libya: between an intensive and assured development in the short term, or a moderate and durable development, but in a more uncertain socio-economic context, in the long term. This is the classic problem of distribution of mining income in an ‘uncertain future’.
That also means extending the conflict between the use of natural resources in time, monopolising resources by the present generation, and forcing future generations to have recourse to unconventional resources.
• The inter-sectorial conflicts may be enlarged at a regional or national scale. The most important is the rivalry between the irrigated agriculture sector and that of the urban supply, the second generally having a higher priority and a greater economic capacity. Incidentally, competition may
1. See map ‘Resources en eau communes des pays de la Région de l’OSS. Bassins fluviaux et aquifères profonds transfontières’
(OSS, 1995).
also oppose industry and agriculture, or occasionally hydroelectric production and agriculture. In this second case, the conflict arises especially from certain economic conditions and it is exacerbated in seasons or years of drought. It has been noticed that the objectives of hydroelectric production, which motivated the first generation hydraulic equipment in the Maghreb and Egypt, have been relegated to second place behind irrigation in recent development plans. However, the low added value of the agricultural uses of water will handicap them in the future, in relation to urban and industrial uses.
• To these usage conflicts can be added the tensions between users of water and people subjected to the effects of external uses: the most extensive case of this is pollution by the return of water used in the fluvial systems which constitute another form of upstream/downstream conflict, including, naturally, the border crossing basins where they take on an international dimension.
That poses the problem of distribution of the respective costs of upstream purification or downstream drinking water treatment, between the communities concerned.
More widely, when the natural water resource exploitation rate is very high, the protection of their quality becomes increasingly and globally necessary. That imposes constraints and increasing costs on numerous people occupying the soil, such as farmers, in order to reduce or buffer the impact of their activities, but which they can ill afford.
It is a question then of conflict between the requirements of water supply security, notably in quality, and those of socio-economic development, that the scarcity of available water renders incompatible.
• From an economic point of view, the general question of distribution of costs is posed, between beneficiary users on the one hand, public authorities and communities on the other, whether it be a matter of water development, production and water supply, treatment, purification or protection. The relative importance given to the public service or to the market mechanisms have an effect on the evolution of demand.
• Finally, concerning water policy orientation of each country, a certain competition is instituted between the appropriate ways and means to ensure a supply/demand balance: between the supply approach (development, production) which civil engineers prefer and the less costly demand approach which is more closely related to socioeconomic measures the effectiveness of which is less assured and temporally deferred.
The combination of the different types and sizes of water resources (Chap. 1) and different present or projected degrees of tension between demands and resources (Chap. 2) results in a wide geographic variety of problems and conflicts in the OSS region (Table 23). The ways and means of water