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From a Water Sharing Conflict to the Creation of a Watershed Management Institution in West-Central Bhutan
 Rice
growers in Lingmuteychu have for many years to share a limited amount
of water to irrigate their highland terraces at 1200- 2200 m amsl. At
this altitude, the period propitious to rice transplanting is very short,
and stirs up repeated disputes for timely access to the precious resource
between the stepped village communities. Customary rules cannot solve
these disputes whilst cropping practices change with the adoption of commercial
crops. An initiative encouraging community-based management of renewable
natural resources (CB-NRM) was launched by the Ministry of Agriculture
and Lingmuteychu was chosen as one of the pilot sites. Having been trained
in companion modelling, the local team leader, Tayan Raj Gurung decided
to use the approach in an attempt to mediate the dispute between the two
highest villages. The process was then extended to all seven villages
in the catchment area, then to two more sites in the Eastern part of the
country.
Two phases can be distinguished in the implementation of the approach in two distinct cycles:
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First cycle (2003-2004): (i) review of the literature
on the local agrarian system and in particular about existing knowledge
about the conflict on agricultural water use, (ii) design of a first
role-playing game on water sharing between two villages to better
understand the decisions of various types of farmers in each village,
at the village level and between the two communities, (iii) following
a test with RNR-RC researchers, first workshop based on gaming sessions
under three different modes of communication demonstrating the effects
of farmers' decisions on the satisfaction of water requirements and
cropping results, (iv) six months later, second workshop with an improved
version of the game (possibility to exchange water against labour,
etc.) and more diverse participants and observers. A modification
to the collective rules for sharing water was adopted, but not formalised,
and not applied the following year, (v) construction of a multi-agent
model similar to the game and simulation of numerous scenarios of
exchange protocols among farmers analysed in T. R. Gurung's thesis,
(vi) preparation of a second cycle at the whole sub-watershed scale.
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Second cycle (2005-2006): (i) design and testing (with RNR-RC researchers) of a very abstract role playing game on water sharing among seven stepped villages, (ii) workshop based on this role-playing game used with village representatives according to varied modes of communicating among villages (first each village played autonomously, then inter-village communication was allowed), (iii) facilitation of plenary discussions aiming at the creation of a sub-catchment resources management committee and adoption of a common action plan, (iv) support to the drawing up of the by-laws of the watershed committee and search of funding to implement the committee's first action plan.
The collaborative modelling could be spaced out over a long period at this site thanks to the intensive involvement of Buthanese colleagues from RNR-RC Bajo and of the agricultural extension worker, a key facilitator in the process, based at the site. Funding from UNDP was used to rehabilitate irrigation channels, protect springs and plant community forests in 2006-2007.
For further information:
an article on the approach is available in Gurung et al ., 2006
Poster in
English: Gurung et al., 2004
Available commented slide show in English  and in
Dzongkha 
Video in English (10 mn) on the first ComMod cycle : 
| Last update: January
5, 2010 |
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