Brazil Freshwater Resource Rights Report

Background

Water is an invaluable natural resource and is vital to the planet's biological cycles and environmental balance. The Amazon region holds 20% of all fresh water on the planet.. Therefore, the use and conservation of this stock of water resource essential to life must be strategic in the Amazonian model of sustainable development. Most of the world's water conflicts are due to scarcity, but in Brazil, paradoxically, some disputes occur due to high supply.

In the case of the Amazon, construction of hydroelectric dams, mining and deforestation are pointed out as some of the activities that generate conflict. They bring as consequence the displacement of population contingents, changes in the cycle of water bodies and contamination of rivers, among other conflicts with local populations that live next to rivers, lakes and streams that depend on quality water to maintain their customs and quality of life. In the last decades, watersheds have gained importance as a planning and environmental management unit due to their environmental peculiarities, huge demand for water resources and their connection with human activities.

The objective of this study is to analyze the legal framework on the right of access to water, fisheries, and associated resources, and how these legal instruments interfere with the lives of riverine populations; and evaluate how these instruments are being applied and the capacity of riverine populations to order the access and use of these basic resources in the context of major transformations in the Tapajós River basin.

Citation

The Nature Conservancy. (2020). Analysis of the regulations and knowledge of the riparians on access to fresh water, fishing and associated resources in the Tapajós River Basin. 

Keywords: freshwater; local communities; Indigenous Peoples; rights; Brazil; riparian communities; Tapajos