Capacity Building for Water Management: Some Personal Thoughts

Capacity building has become a critical requirement for improving water management practices significantly in the future. The current attempts to enhance capacity are a useful beginning, but they suffer from numerous conceptual and operational constraints, some of which are discussed in this paper. Unless these constraints are objectively identified, and the entire process is carefully planned to overcome these problems promptly and cost-effectively, benefits that are likely to accrue from such efforts would at best be incremental. However, if planned and implemented properly, capacity building has the potential to contribute to a quantum leap in water management during the early part of the 21st century.