Freshwater resources face rising pressure to provide for the social, economic and environmental needs of an expanding world population. And, due to the growing intensity and frequency of droughts in some regions, water access is becoming an increasingly important concern for government and business.
Pressures from a global consumer economy, climate variability and population growth are all affecting the ability to manage watersheds sustainably. To face today’s challenges, all economic sectors need to continue to develop water-efficient technologies and practices.
Communication challenges
One of the main difficulties in this context is improving communication between scientists and decision-makers. Scientific literature is frequently not well understood by people outside the specialty and can be relatively inaccessible. Moreover, the need to address pressing political issues often means that, by the time scientific information becomes available, a policy decision has already been made.
Public sector decision-makers from many Latin American countries face budgetary constraints and citizen demand for information and participation in policymaking. Therefore, it is necessary to improve relationships between stakeholders, and apply the best communication methods to overcome conflicts and maximise the efficiency of scarce resources.
As a result, communication tools to support decision-making have become increasingly popular. However, a barrier persists between those who produce and those who use science. It is necessary to remedy this by establishing mechanisms that allow sustained interaction between both groups, and simultaneously promote the incorporation of scientific knowledge into policy decisions, as well as to feed the research agenda with the practical experience, and the needs and interests of society.
A strategic solution
Boundary organisations – institutions that work across scientific research and political decision-making – help interpret and manage the production of scientific literature and its implementation in policymaking. They also offer water and science stakeholders, and communities an opportunity to reconcile structural differences through co-adaptation.
The Strategic Decisions Hub (or NED, as it’s known in Spanish), a joint initiative between FEMSA Foundation, the Inter-American Development Bank, Tecnológico de Monterrey and the Water Center for Latin America and the Caribbean, is one example of a boundary organisation.
NED provides a collaborative space for developing a shared understanding of complex relationships between economic, environmental and social systems by analysing data and integrating the participation of everyone from professors to politicians.
Meetings between stakeholders are designed to reconcile the divergent priorities of science and policy communities, as well as allowing data-sharing and the use of complex socio-ecological modelling, including tools for visualisation, simulation, collaboration, deliberation and decision support.
The main objective of NED is to contribute to bridging the gaps in policy-making processes in Latin America and the Caribbean. It does this by supporting the establishment of a decision-making system and the development of accompanying tools and practices for water resources management through pilot studies.
Bringing politicians and scientists together
According to White and Corley, researchers from Arizona State University, boundary organisations can help stabilise and order interactions between the scientific and political communities within a context of high uncertainty. Such uncertainty is incorporated into policy design through the application of the precautionary principle, which implies taking preventive action, exploring a wider range of alternatives and broadening public participation in decision-making.
NED looks forward to foster technical expertise in the region, encourage the development of user-friendly tools and practices, as well as disseminate the findings of the decision-making experience with interested institutions through the Water Network for Latin America and the Caribbean.
The effective application of NED’s technological and methodological approach for better water resources management policies will depend on the conditions of each case and the institutional and contingent context of the decision process itself.
Solutions to specific problems in the water sector involve several actors and stakeholders with divergent objectives. In this case, having a physical location prepared to facilitate the visualisation of constraints, impacts, and advantages of a given scenario, and the collaborative participation of a network of experts, are proving to be a useful system to support policymaking. Nevertheless, it is crucial that all sectors get involved in order to develop a sustainable water management culture.
Content on this page is paid for and provided by FEMSA Foundation, a sponsor of the Guardian Global Development Professionals Network.
