This book presents a valuable new tool for water management water resource accounting which significantly advances the economic analysis of water. Water resource accounts integrate detailed information about water supply and use with national income accounts to show the economic use of water, costs and tariffs paid, and the economic value of water for different economic uses. Based on the UN s handbook for environmental accounting, this book describes the implementation and policy application of water accounts in three African countries Botswana, Namibia and South Africa and discusses how they have been used by water managers. The book compares water use across the three countries, explaining the differences in water resources and water policy. In addition to the comprehensive outline of physical and monetary water accounts for each country, the authors provide an extensive discussion of water valuation as well as addressing a number of issues of regional importance, including water accounting for an international river basin and the impact of trade on each country s water use. By demonstrating the usefulness of water resource accounts, this book makes a major contribution to the literature on water economics and management, sustainable development, and to the development of environmental accounting in general. The Economics of Water Management in Southern Africa will appeal to a wide readership including: environmental and development economists NGOs concerned with sustainable development environmental advocacy groups professionals (economists and environmentalists) working in Africa on water and sustainable development issues water professionals national accounts experts and statisticians.

In 1994 South Africa saw the end of apartheid. The new era of political freedom was seen as the foundation for economic prosperity and inclusion. The last two decades have seen mixed results. Economic growth has been volatile. While inequalities in public services have been reduced, income inequality has increased, and poverty has remained stagnant. As the twentieth anniversary of the transition to democracy approaches in 2014, the economic policy debates in South Africa are in full flow. They combine a stocktake of the various programs of the last two decades with a forward looking discussion of strategy in the face of an ever open but volatile global economy. Underlying the discourse are basic and often unresolved differences on an appropriate strategy for an economy like South Africa, with a strong natural resource base but with deeply entrenched inherited inequalities, especially across race. This volume contributes to the policy and analytical debate by pulling together perspectives on a range of issues: micro, macro, sectoral, country wide and global, from leading economists working on South Africa. Other than the requirement that it be analytical and not polemical, the contributors were given freedom to put forward their particular perspective on their topic. The economists invited are from within South Africa and from outside; from academia and the policy world; from international and national level economic policy agencies. The contributors include recognized world leaders in South African economic analysis, as well as the very best of the younger crop of economists who are working on the study of South Africa, the next generation of leaders in thought and policy.

The impact of invasive species is second only to that of human population growth and associated activities as a cause of the loss of biodiversity throughout the world. In the United States, invasions of nonnative plants, animals, or microbes cause major environmental damage. The second edition of Biological Invasions: Economic and Environmental Cos

Offering a cross-country examination and comparison of drought awareness and experience, this book shows how scientists, water managers, and policy makers approach drought and water scarcity in arid and semi-arid regions of Spain, Mexico, Australia, South Africa and the United States.

This groundbreaking book examines the role that water accounting can play in resolving economic, environmental and social issues. One of the most pressing global issues of the 21st century is the scarcity of water to ensure economic, environmental and social sustainability. In addressing the issue through policy and management, access to high quality information is critically important. But water scarcity has many implications, and it is possible that different reporting approaches, generally called water accounting systems, can be appropriate to addressing them. In this key book, international experts respond to the question: what role can water accounting play in resolving economic, social and environmental issues at individual, organizational, industry, national and international levels? They explore how various forms of water accounting are utilized and the issues that they address. Academics and postgraduate students interested in water scarcity and accounting will find this book invaluable. Policymakers in all areas relating to water as well as environmentalists, water industry managers and water lawyers will find plenty of important insights in this essential resource.

One of the early set of reforms that South Africa embarked on after emerging from apartheid was in the water sector, following a remarkable, consultative process. The policy and legal reforms were comprehensive and covered almost all aspects of water management including revolutionary changes in defining and allocating rights to water, radical reforms in water management and supply institutions, the introduction of the protection of environmental flows, and major shifts in charging for water use and in the provision of free basic water. Over ten years of implementation of these policy and legislative changes mean that valu­able lessons have already been learned and useful experiences gained in the challenge of effective water resources management and water services provision in a middle income country.