TY - JOUR
T1 - Sustaining Coupled Irrigation Infrastructures
T2 - Multiple Instruments for Multiple Dilemmas
AU - Vallury, Sechindra
AU - Abbott, Joshua K.
AU - Shin, Hoon C.
AU - Anderies, John M.
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors gratefully acknowledge the logistical support from the Foundation for Ecological Security to conduct our fieldwork in South India. The fieldwork for this study was financially supported by The Neely Foundation Food and Agriculture Sustainability Research Grant Program , USA. We also thank the three anonymous reviewers for their detailed, constructive, and supportive feedback.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 Elsevier B.V.
Copyright:
Copyright 2020 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2020/12
Y1 - 2020/12
N2 - In order to smooth the availability of water and address water scarcity, shared irrigation infrastructure is constructed in many irrigation systems. However, maintaining contributions to shared infrastructure has grown increasingly challenging as private infrastructure, such as groundwater pumps, have become attractive substitutes. This problem is especially acute in the semiarid regions of South Asia. We model South Indian tank irrigation systems as an example of a coupled infrastructure system that captures these real-world challenges. We developed a replicator dynamic model to analyze the interactions of multiple policy instruments to address interlinked appropriation and provisioning dilemmas in a coupled infrastructure system. We demonstrate that a fixed fee levied on groundwater users combined with highly differentiated fees on tank users can improve the provision of the shared tank significantly, yield higher profits, and greater equality of livelihoods. However, the presence of private infrastructure limits the ability to credibly implement sufficiently high fees. This institutional complexity is decidedly “second best” – falling well short of the outcomes available if the substitution to private infrastructure were more effectively managed.
AB - In order to smooth the availability of water and address water scarcity, shared irrigation infrastructure is constructed in many irrigation systems. However, maintaining contributions to shared infrastructure has grown increasingly challenging as private infrastructure, such as groundwater pumps, have become attractive substitutes. This problem is especially acute in the semiarid regions of South Asia. We model South Indian tank irrigation systems as an example of a coupled infrastructure system that captures these real-world challenges. We developed a replicator dynamic model to analyze the interactions of multiple policy instruments to address interlinked appropriation and provisioning dilemmas in a coupled infrastructure system. We demonstrate that a fixed fee levied on groundwater users combined with highly differentiated fees on tank users can improve the provision of the shared tank significantly, yield higher profits, and greater equality of livelihoods. However, the presence of private infrastructure limits the ability to credibly implement sufficiently high fees. This institutional complexity is decidedly “second best” – falling well short of the outcomes available if the substitution to private infrastructure were more effectively managed.
KW - Common-pool resources
KW - Coupled infrastructure systems
KW - Groundwater management
KW - Institutional analysis
KW - Replicator dynamics
KW - Second-best outcomes
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U2 - 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2020.106793
DO - 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2020.106793
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85089469901
SN - 0921-8009
VL - 178
JO - Ecological Economics
JF - Ecological Economics
M1 - 106793
ER -