Technological and Institutional Options for Common Property Resources Management in Rainfed Areas

Abstract

Common Property Resources (CPRs) of land, water, forest, fisheries, wildlife and agriculture constitute an important component of community assets in India, and they underpin the livelihoods of millions of poor people, living particularly in rainfed areas, with few alternative economic opportunities. Rapid depletion and continuous decline in the physical productivity of CPRs, and, the unequal access and control of the poor on CPRs have been the major factors of displacing a large number of people from rainfed areas and reducing their status to environmental refugees. There is widespread lack of understanding of the relationship between people and CPRs in the context of rainfed areas. As a result, design and implementation of appropriate policies for CPRs management has therefore become a major Challenge. More recently, the realization that design of effective CPRs management system must be based on a fair understanding of interplay between technical and institutional arrangements has led to fresh research interest and work in the rainfed areas. This paper advocates that CPRs management problems are associated with inadequate understanding and investment in evolving appropriate technical and institutional arrangements in the rainfed areas. Initially this paper discusses the technical and institutional dimensions of CPRs governance, links between CPRs and livelihoods and then documents example of successful common property regimes from rainfed areas, and, finally identifies important policy issues to strengthen CPRs - rainfed area development link.