Assessing the impact of urbanization on the water management functions in peri urban areas

Abstract

Cities in Asia and India are dependent on their peri-urban water resources, threatened by the urbanization processes. In an increasingly urbanising world, to ensure sustainability of the environmental, socioeconomic and ecological services, sustenance of peri-urban water resources against the damage caused by urbanization is a critical requirement. Globally at present, sustaining water resources is viewed as a governance challenge. Understanding the impact of urbanization on water governance is thus, the key to advocate measures for the sustenance of peri-urban water resources. Peri-urban water governance reforms in India face two significant challenges. They are; complexity in the mix of formal and informal institutions that manage the water resources; and difficulties faced on ground at the management level in the implementation of the policies. The cause of this difficulty is the lack of data at management level. Assessment of the impact of urbanization on the peri-urban water management systems will enable this understanding. However, assessing the impact of urbanization on the water management systems in peri-urban areas of India is hampered by the lack of frameworks that can address the complexities in the context. The aim of this research is thus, to evolve a framework for assessing the impact of urbanization on the water governance systems in peri-urban areas. The research, therefore, had adopted a problem identification approach with the intention that the findings from the research will lead to greater understanding and therefore better policy and planning for the sustenance of the water resources. In this sense, this research adopts a pragmatic world view. The research adopts the following two steps to answer the research enquiry; 1. Formulation of a framework for assessing impact of urbanization on water management systems in peri-urban areas 2. Application of the framework to assess the impact of urbanization on the water management systems in peri-urban areas of Chennai. newline newline