It has been argued that dam projects on shared rivers may provide opportunities for cooperation and the sharing of benefits among co-riparian states (discourse on international benefit sharing). In parallel, a discourse on local benefit sharing emphasizes that the population affected by dams should benefit from the projects in the long term. This raises the question of how international and local benefit sharing can be combined and whether these concepts are taken up in recent hydropower projects (HPPs) on shared rivers. This question was studied using the cases of the Ruzizi III and Rusumo Falls border river HPPs in Africa's Great Lakes region. The paper finds that the two projects indeed foresee both international and local benefit-sharing mechanisms, even if the actors involved hardly refer to international and local benefit sharing as concepts or link the two. At international level, the infrastructure will be jointly owned and electricity equally shared by the countries involved which can be considered good practice for border river projects. At local level, compensation processes are planned according to World Bank policies and various benefit-sharing mechanisms are envisioned. However, so far no revenue-based benefit sharing is foreseen that would ensure that the project-affected population will benefit in the long term.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.