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Project properties |
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| Title | Reorienting agricultural water management through strategic planning? |
| Group | Water Resources Management group |
| Project type | thesis |
| Credits | 36 |
| Supervisor(s) | Chris Seijger |
| Examiner(s) | |
| Contact info | chris.seijger@wur.nl |
| Begin date | 2020/01/01 |
| End date | 2022/01/31 |
| Description | Country: student is free to select a case study
Host institute: have to be sought after case study is selected Period: open Problem context The global challenges for agricultural water management are tremendous: towards 2050 the world’s population will grow with ~25% towards 10 billion in 2050. As a result, food consumption and production will surge to higher levels. Societies have put land and water resources increasingly under pressure to feed a growing population (e.g. deforestation for agricultural expansion, closed river basins, environmental pollution). In addition, climate change affects crops and water resources in many ways (changed rainfall patterns, river flows, higher temperatures and evapotranspiration). To address these massive challenges, reorientations for agricultural water management are proposed in strategic (long-term, visionary) policies and plans. For instance in the Bangladesh Delta Plan (from silted to dynamic tidal rivers), Mekong Delta Plan (from rice to brackish aquaculture), Ethiopia Grand Transformation Plan, EU Green Deal, or Saudi Arabia (phasing out of wheat). But to what extent can societies reorient agricultural water management through such strategic planning? Research Objective/Question What sort of reorientations for land-water systems are proposed in strategic plans of your case study? How do they differ from “business as usual” strategies, and how do they change patterns of water access, allocation, justice, farm livelihoods? How do reorientations travel from plan to field level, and field level to plan level? What is expected from the student (type of research) Basically you have a lot of freedom to shape your thesis. You select a river basin or delta area, and study strategic policy documents and reorientations in agricultural water management from plan to field level. An interesting case study might be one of the examples mentioned above, but there are many more (Australia, China, etc.). You are free to select your main research method, from desk study (e.g. study of historical strategic plans and decisions) to interviews (how are reorientations implemented?), agro-hydrological modeling (e.g. runs of proposed reorientations), and field surveys. |
| Used skills | shape and develop your own master thesis |
| Requirements | communicative, independent, interdisciplinary analyses in land-water systems, planning+field perspective |