División de la opinión pública española sobre las estrategias sostenibles del agua. Metodología EASW para la acción consensuada

Abstract

Conflicts and devided opinion over the water strategies have sharpened in Spain during the years 2000-2001, in which the new National Plan on Water was drawn up by the Government. The main solution launched by the Government, in order to cope with increasing water consumption in the long term, is a large transfer of water from the northern region to southern and eastern regions of the country. Groups of experts and community based associations consider this strategy scarcely satisfactory as a technical and social solution for water. Social actors, who are active or passively involved in the decision-making process concerning the future of water resources, give different reasons for their support or rejection of that plan. This article analyzes the arguments expressed by the different social sectors, i.e., the public administration; the private business and enterprises, the scientific and technological sector, and the community based organizations. With the information they provide, we try to built the structural problematic regarding water sustainability of the coming years. Basically the problematics consist in the following: wether solution is through massive public spending on water transfer, considering that the cost of water will be liberalized in the coming years, and will habe to be paid for by regions and citizens; or throught the inmediate involvement of general population in reducing consumption and in maximising profit from available water, by means of the new environmental technologies.