| Chapter 1: | Water Resources Development and Management in Sub-Saharan Africa |
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is the world's poorest region and the only region in which per capita food production and income have actually declined in recent decades (United Nations Environmental Program, 2000). In light of these realities, it would seem that additional control of SSA's still abundant water resources would be a major focus in achieving African economic and social development goals, for example, as embodied in national poverty reduction strategies (Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, 2006) and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) (United Nations Development Program, 2007).
In SSA, large-scale hydropower and irrigation development typically affects transboundary water management. Transboundary watersheds occupy more than 60% of the region's land mass and contain 93% of the continent's population and 77% of the continent's water resources (Lautze & Giordano, 2005; United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, 2000; Turton, Earle, Malzbender, & Ashton, 2006). As a result of the dependence on transboundary waters, a dependence arguably greater than for any other region in the world, transboundary water governance in Africa forms a core part of almost any regional water strategy (Lautze & Giordano, 2007).
Water management at all smaller geographic scales, down to the community level where management decisions must be made usually by government and nongovernment institutions (NGOs) and communities themselves, poses increasing challenges in SSA to meet local needs in the face of increasing water scarcity and limited capacities (Lenton & Muller, 2009; Pender, Place, & Ehui, 2006). Somewhat surprisingly, despite a continuing need for water resources development (e.g., for domestic use, on-farm storage, and large-scale dam construction for irrigation and hydropower), the rate of development in SSA has gradually declined in recent decades as the orientation of SSA's water institutions has swayed with global policy shifts (Food and Agriculture Organization, 2001; World Commission on Dams, 2000). This development has contributed to leaving the world's poorest countries hostage to hydrology (Grey & Sadoff, 2007).
Ethiopia, the major contributor to the flow of the Nile, has risen to the forefront in water resources development in Africa. In pursuing its