Sharing the load? Floods, droughts, and managing international rivers

John Janmaat () and Arjan Ruijs

Environment and Development Economics, 2007, vol. 12, issue 4, 573-592

Abstract: Rivers can be both givers of life and takers of life. Investments that provide protection against flooding are often beneficial during normal or low flows. Investments such as storage reservoirs are long lived, separating construction and management operations. With international rivers, the absence of enforcement mechanisms may preclude infrastructure collaboration. Where physical infrastructure is in an upstream nation, downstream impacts may be ignored after the structure has been completed. Using a game theoretic model, it is shown that downstream cooperation may only be rational when flooding is the primary downstream impact. A stylized arid developing region and humid developed region are compared. Potential gains from collaboration are greatest in arid regions, but may be difficult to achieve. There may be little scope for capturing the gains from basin level management if economic integration does not extend beyond water issues.

Date: 2007
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/ ... type/journal_article link to article abstract page (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cup:endeec:v:12:y:2007:i:04:p:573-592_00

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Environment and Development Economics from Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press, UPH, Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge CB2 8BS UK.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Kirk Stebbing ().