The applicability of the collaborative planning approach to water management:: A case study in Mexico

Water management and planning problems like scarcity competition and mismanagement are becoming source of conflicts worldwide and in Mexico. Planning approaches to face those problems have been designed. The main approaches that have been used are the supply oriented, the demand oriented and the integrated/holistic one. The effectiveness of each approach has depended on the severity of water resource problems. However, the current situation characterized by a diversity of multiple visions and multiple interests frequently give rise to conflicts due to how the resource is used and allocated. Consequently, planning approaches that integrate those visions, identify the different interests and solve conflicts are being needed. For this purpose, in the 1990 decade collaborative planning, as an alternative approach to rational planning emerges. This approach has been regarded as the dominant paradigm in resource management in the twenty century. Under this situation, it was employed to evaluate its effectiveness to solve water use and allocation problems in a case study in La Mancha, a coastal watershed in the Municipality of Actopan, Veracruz. The evaluation's results revealed that the effectiveness of the approach depends on several conditions, but it could be used as an alternative planning approach to those currently being applied in Mexico.