The Formalisation of Water Use and Conditional Ownership in Colca Valley, Peru
This article discusses the production and negotiation of water ownership among peasant farmers in the Majes-Colca watershed in southern Peru, where the public water administration initiated a process of formalising user rights for potable water in 2011. While a large-scale irrigation project chan...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Water Alternatives Association
2019-06-01
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| Series: | Water Alternatives |
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| Online Access: | http://www.water-alternatives.org/index.php/alldoc/articles/vol12/v12issue3/540-a12-2-23/file |
| Summary: | This article discusses the production and negotiation of water ownership among peasant farmers in the
Majes-Colca watershed in southern Peru, where the public water administration initiated a process of formalising
user rights for potable water in 2011. While a large-scale irrigation project channels water from the headwaters to
export-oriented agriculture in the desert, the supply of water is getting scarcer because of climate change. The
Peruvian water resources law from 2009 acknowledges water as public property, yet emphasises its economic value
and encourages private investment. The farmers in the highlands see water not only as a resource but also as a lifegiving force provided by the mountain-beings to the humans living in their domains. Seeing ownership as an ongoing and dynamic process, and 'commoning' as made by practices of nurture, the article argues that conditional
forms of ownership emerge from relationships of reciprocity between humans and other-than-human beings. These
are modes of ownership that exceed the dichotomies of private-public, commons-commodity and subject-object. |
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| ISSN: | 1965-0175 1965-0175 |