The River Basin Concept and Global Climate Change

Abstract

Nature fashioned the river basin as an ecological system or unit. When water use intensified toward the end of the nineteenth century, it was perceived that the waters of the basin formed a unified system and that, for efficiency of use, they should be treated as such. Thus was born the concept of the integrated river basin as a unit for water management under an autonomous basinwide administration. In some instances, basin commissions acquired powers extending over other resources as well as water. (...)