Indigenous Water Property Rights: A International Perspective

Abstract

"Indigenous water property rights arise today generally from the survival of customary tenures in postcolonial common law countries. These rights and their associated river management regimes present unique challenges for both developing and developed countries. Existing common law and statutory tidal and non tidal rights are a complex overlay of public and private property rights which are themselves undergoing significant change through the commodification of many natural resources, such as marine species stock and non-tidal water. The melding of indigenous river management practices with existing non indigenous management regimes has throughout the common law world shown that there is considerable potential for both sustainability of resource utilisation, and respect for indigenous water property rights. Even in non common law countries with a tradition of Islamic law there is evidence that indigenous water property rights have been respected both now and in the past, providing increasing proof that there are core principles which permit both indigenous and non indigenous rights to exist co-operatively."