Local responses to too much and too little water in the greater Himalayan region
structures are not failure-proof as evidenced by eight with the involvement of communities and civil society
failures in the past. Considering the projections for future in environmental governance and in the development
climate change, these conventional structures could process.
cause further distress and destruction.
To the state’s credit, it has helped communities respond
Communities have been experimenting and innovating to water-stresses through improvements in transport and
strategies to deal with water stress and hazards in their communication networks in the region, huge investments
own ways. These innovations include in rural development, present (albeit weak) law
• making adjustments in the cropping cycle and better
enforcement, and working democratic political systems.
cultivation methods;
These enabling measures need to be further strengthened
• introducing new and improved crop varieties and
and streamlined.
use of waterlogged land for water lily cultivation
and sand-covered land for vegetable cultivation;
Communities have their own autonomous responses to
and
cope with excessive floods or droughts. The promotion
• using cheap, locally available, and appropriate
of these autonomous measures and other measures
technologies for irrigation, such as bamboo tube-
could improve the communities’ general well-being. This
wells and movable pumping sets.
study could not determine the extent of these practices
and their effect on the overall well-being of the people.
These ‘softer approaches’ devised by the people
Further studies and detailed analysis are needed to
themselves compensate many of the losses incurred
understand the benefits of these measures.
from floods, droughts, and other hazards. They are
based on the approach ‘get away from the flood rather
Finally, community-initiated responses provide a blueprint
than prevent it’, which is an ecologically sound way of
for scaling up and strengthening an adaptation strategy
dealing with rivers in flood plains.
for the region. There can be no permanent or fixed
adaptation strategies as a resilient system or community
There is a need to rethink the way we deal with rivers
requires flexiblity to change strategies according to
and other natural resources in floodplains as reflected
the demands of the situation. Better governance must
in policy instruments and in a structural change in
provide the enabling structure for this flexibility. Increased
governance at the local and national levels. The delivery
investments should focus on improving the capacity of
of government programmes and schemes will improve
communities to adapt.
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