Summary and Conclusions

Abstract

This work presents new evidence that helps to question existing paradigms and tenets related to water policy and management in Spain. Historically, the management of water resources has focused on the supply side, securing water access through an engineering approach that has been, in most cases, a costly endeavour from economic and environmental perspectives. These technical solutions have been based on a combination of reservoirs and inter-basin transfers resulting in increasing abstractions of both surface and groundwater, the latter being primarily tapped by private entrepreneurs. This approach rarely changed the incentive structures and, heavily based on command and control measures, failed to control groundwater use in most sectors, thus leaving the major driving forces of water use largely unchanged. This fact only partially has been considered in this work because of lack of consistent data on groundwater uses. It is expected that this gap will be changed soon when the hydrological plans of the river basins are finalised and submitted to the EU Commission in early 2010.