“Good Dredging Practices”: The Place of Traditional Eco-livelihood Knowledge

Residents of most rural communities in developing countries depend on surface water resources for their livelihoods. The development and management of this vital resource should as much as possible take into consideration local socio-economic priorities if sustainable development is to be achieved at local levels in these countries. Inland river dredging is a water resource management strategy usually aimed at improving water courses for navigation, land reclamation and or mitigate flood in the dredged catchment. Dredging operations like most development projects have impacts that are often localised, and benefits that could be local, regional or national. “Good dredging practices”, GDP, in industrialised countries have been aimed at balancing national/regional economic benefits, technical feasibility and environmental protection. These practices rely heavily on the quality, and quantity of available relevant base-line data. In most developing countries there is a dearth of baseline data, and often national/regional economic gains do not necessarily translate into local livelihood benefits. Hence, the basis of GDP should be extended to incorporate local livelihoods priorities, without ignoring the relevance of scientific data when it is available, the issue of technical feasibility, environmental sustainability and economic viability. This approach is relevant to the demand for equitable development in the developing world; could be used in conjunction with traditional eco-livelihoods knowledge in developing or determining appropriate approaches for sustainable surface water resources management, as well as reducing environmental conflicts between stakeholders. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009