Challenges to Water Security along the “Emerald Coast”: A Political Ecology of Local Water Governance in Nicaragua

Despite being a water-rich country, Nicaragua struggles to secure clean water access for many of its residents. In addition to distributional and water quality issues, a prolonged drought affecting all regions of the country has compounded preexisting governance challenges to ensuring rural water ne...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Water (Basel) 2017-08, Vol.9 (9), p.655
Main Authors: LaVanchy, G., Romano, Sarah, Taylor, Matthew
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Beryl
Climate variability
Drought
Droughts
Ecology
Fresh water
Groundwater
Hydrology
Industrial development
Ireland
Latin America
Laws, regulations and rules
Natural resources
Nicaragua
Rural areas
Rural communities
Security
Tourism
Tourism development
Travel industry
United Kingdom
Water demand
Water governance
Water policy
Water quality
Water security
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Summary:Despite being a water-rich country, Nicaragua struggles to secure clean water access for many of its residents. In addition to distributional and water quality issues, a prolonged drought affecting all regions of the country has compounded preexisting governance challenges to ensuring rural water needs. This article focuses on a rural community along the southwest Pacific Coast of Tola, Nicaragua, where tourism development and drought converge to produce and exacerbate water insecurity. This article examines this water insecurity in the context of two recent national water laws in Nicaragua (passed in 2007 and 2010 respectively) that sought to provide a more comprehensive legal framework for freshwater water governance. Drawing upon semi-structured interviews and groundwater and meteorological data, we contend that water laws have not effectively mediated the hydrological effects of prolonged drought and tourism development, resulting in pronounced water insecurity for local populations in Tola. We cast the findings of this research as relevant to other water insecure areas in Latin America where industry development and weak policy implementation impact the creation and resolution of local water security—including insecurity compounded by increased climatic variability.
ISSN:2073-4441
2073-4441
DOI:10.3390/w9090655