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The impact of the water rights system on smallholder irrigators' willingness to pay for water in Limpopo province, South Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 July 2010

STIJN SPEELMAN ,
STEFANO FAROLFI ,
AYMEN FRIJA ,
MARIJKE D'HAESE  and
LUC D'HAESE
STIJN SPEELMAN
Affiliation:
Department of Agricultural Economics, Ghent University, Coupure links 653, 9000 Gent, Belgium. Tel: 0032 9 264 62 04. Fax: 0032 9 264 62 46. Email: Stijn.speelman@ugent.be
STEFANO FAROLFI
Affiliation:
CIRAD, UMR G Eau and Centre for Environmental Economics and Policy in Africa (CEEPA), University of Pretoria, Pretoria 0002, Republic of South Africa. Email: stefano.farolfi@up.ac.za
AYMEN FRIJA
Affiliation:
Department of Agricultural Economics, Ghent University, Coupure links 653, 9000 Gent, Belgium. Email: aymen.frija@ugent.be
MARIJKE D'HAESE
Affiliation:
Department of Agricultural Economics, Ghent University, Coupure links 653, 9000 Gent, Belgium. Email: Marijke.dhaese@ugent.be
LUC D'HAESE
Affiliation:
Department of Agricultural Economics, Ghent University, Coupure links 653, 9000 Gent, Belgium, and Department of Applied Biological Sciences, University of Antwerp, Groenenborgerlaan 171, 2020 Antwerpen, Belgium. Emails: luc.dhaese@ugent.be, luc.dhaese@ua.ac.be
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Abstract

Water rights are currently receiving increased attention from scholars and policymakers due to the growing understanding that ill-defined water rights impair efficient use. In South Africa, smallholder irrigation faces problems of low water use efficiency and cost recovery of government investments. This study uses contingent ranking to analyse the willingness to pay (WTP) of smallholder irrigators for changes in the water rights system. The results indicate that smallholders are prepared to pay considerably higher water prices if these are connected to improvements in the water rights system. By segmenting the population it was also shown that the importance attached to water rights dimensions varies in each segment. While lower institutional trust and lower income levels lead to a lower WTP for transferability, experiencing water shortage increases this WTP. Such information is valuable in guiding policy makers in the future design of water rights.

Type
Research Article
Information
Environment and Development Economics , Volume 15 , Issue 4 , August 2010 , pp. 465 - 483
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2010

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