Developing community-based watershed management in Greater São Paulo: the case of Santo André

Abstract

This paper describes how watershed protection is being combined with settlement upgrading and land-use management within an area that serves as one of Greater São Paulo’s main sources of fresh water. This is being undertaken in the municipality of Santo André. Unlike previous watershed protection measures, which proved ineffective, it recognizes the need to combine the protection of water-sheds with the improvement of conditions in existing settlements and guiding, rather than prohibiting, further settlement. The paper describes how the community-based watershed management involves the inhabitants of illegal settlements and other stakeholders in an adaptive planning framework that first seeks consensus on what is to be planned before developing the plan, its implementation and its operation, maintenance and monitoring.