Abstract

Water resource management is often characterized by conflicts, as a result of the heterogeneity ofinterests associated with a shared resource. Many water conflicts arise on a global scale and, in particular,an increasing level of conflicts can be observed in the Mediterranean basin, characterized by waterscarcity. In the present work, in order to assist the conflict analysis process, and thus outline a propergroundwater management, stakeholders were involved in the process and suitable tools were used ina Mediterranean area (the Apulia region, in Italy). In particular, this paper seeks to elicit and structurefarmers' mental models influencing their decision over the main water source for irrigation. The morecrucial groundwater is for farmers' objectives, the more controversial is the groundwater protectionstrategy. Bayesian Belief Networks were developed to simulate farmers' behavior with regard togroundwater management and to assess the impacts of protection strategy. These results have been usedto calculate the conflict degree in the study area, derived from the introduction of policies for thereduction of groundwater exploitation for irrigation purposes. The less acceptable the policy is, the morelikely it is that conflict will develop between farmers and the Regional Authority. The results of conflictanalysis were also used to contribute to the debate concerning potential conflict mitigation measures.The approach adopted in this work has been discussed with a number of experts in groundwatermanagement policies and irrigation management, and its main strengths and weaknesses have beenidentified. Increasing awareness of the existence of potential conflicts and the need to deal with themcan be seen as an interesting initial shift in the Apulia region's water management regime, which is stillgrounded in merely technical approaches.

Autore Pugliese

• Vurro Michele , Giordano Raffaele

Tutti gli autori

• R. Giordano; D. D'Agostino; C. Apollonio; N. Lamaddalena; M. Vurro

Titolo volume/Rivista

Journal of environmental management

Anno di pubblicazione

2013

ISSN

0301-4797

ISBN

Non Disponibile

Numero di citazioni Wos

Nessuna citazione

Ultimo Aggiornamento Citazioni

Non Disponibile

Numero di citazioni Scopus

Non Disponibile

Ultimo Aggiornamento Citazioni

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Settori ERC

Non Disponibile

Codici ASJC

Non Disponibile