Environmental flows (e‐flows) are powerful tools for sustaining freshwater biodiversity and ecosystem services, but their widespread implementation faces numerous social, political, and economic barriers. These barriers are amplified in water‐limited systems where strong trade‐offs exist between human water needs and freshwater ecosystem protection. We synthesize the complex, multidisciplinary challenges that exist in these systems to help identify targeted solutions to accelerate the adoption and implementation of environmental flows initiatives. We present case studies from three water‐limited systems in North America and synthesize the major barriers to implementing environmental flows. We identify four common barriers: (a) lack of authority to implement e‐flows in water governance structures, (b) fragmented water governance in transboundary water systems, (c) declining water availability and increasing variability under climate change, and (d) lack of consideration of non‐biophysical factors. We then formulate actionable recommendations for decision makers facing these barriers when working towards implementing environmental flows: (a) modify or establish a water governance framework to recognize or allow e‐flows, (b) strive for collaboration across political jurisdictions and social, economic, and environmental sectors, and (c) manage adaptively for climate change in e‐flows planning and recommendations.This article is categorized under: Water and Life > Conservation, Management, and Awareness Human Water > Water Governance Engineering Water > Planning Water

Land use governance in the Brazilian Amazon has undergone significant changes in the last decade. At the national level, law enforcement capacity has increased and downstream industries linked to commodity chains responsible for deforestation have begun to monitor some of their suppliers’ impacts on forests. At the municipal level, local actors have launched a Green Municipality initiative, aimed at eliminating deforestation and supporting green supply chains at the territorial level. In this paper, we analyze the land use transition since 2001 in Paragominas—the first Green Municipality—and discuss the limits of the governance arrangements underpinning these changes. Our work draws on a spatially explicit analysis of biophysical variables and qualitative information collected in interviews with key private and public stakeholders of the main commodity chains operating in the region. We argue that, up to now, the emerging multi-level scheme of land governance has not succeeded in promoting large-scale land use intensification, reforestation and rehabilitation of degraded lands. Moreover, private governance mechanisms based on improved product standards, fail to benefit from potential successful partnerships between the public and private sector at the territorial level. We propose a governance approach that adopts a broader territorial focus as a way forward.

Sandoval-Solis, S., S. Paladino, L. E. Garza-Diaz, L. F. Nava, J. R. Friedman, J. Ortiz-Partida, S. Plassin, G. Gomez-Quiroga, J. A. Koch, J. Fleming, B. A. Lane, S. Wineland, A. Mirchi, R. Saiz-Rodriguez, and T. Neeson. 2022. Environmental flows in the Rio Grande - Rio Bravo basin. Ecology and Society 27(1):20. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-12944-270120

We present a 1:100,000 scale soil texture map of Paragominas county (Pará, Brazil), covering 19,330 km². The method allows rapid production of a soil texture map of a large area where the strength of a duricrust controls the relief. It is based on an easily accessible explanatory variable, topography, which is represented using a Digital Elevation Model. The method makes it possible to map the spatial distribution of the texture of the topsoil layer. Modelling was complemented by field observations to identify the laws governing the spatial organisation of soil textures. The spatial variability of the elevation above sea-level of the duricrust was obtained by Kriging. The error rate of the resulting map is 26%, and the observations of the four soil texture units were respectively 78%, 90%, 41% and 60% accurately located.

Integrative research on water resources requires a wide range of socio-environmental datasets to better understand human-water interactions and inform decision-making. However, in transboundary watersheds, integrating cross-disciplinary and multinational datasets is a daunting task due to the disparity of data sources and the inconsistencies in data format, content, resolution, and language. This paper introduces a socio-environmental geodatabase that transcends political and disciplinary boundaries in the Rio Grande/Río Bravo basin (RGB). The geodatabase aggregates 145 GIS data layers on five main themes: (i) Water & Land Governance, (ii) Hydrology, (iii) Water Use & Hydraulic Infrastructures, (iv) Socio-Economics, and (v) Biophysical Environment. Datasets were primarily collected from public open-access data sources, processed with ArcGIS, and documented through the FGCD metadata standard. By synthesizing a broad array of datasets and mapping public and private water governance, we expect to advance interdisciplinary research in the RGB, provide a replicable approach to dataset compilation for transboundary watersheds, and ultimately foster transboundary collaboration for sustainable resource management.

Improving our understanding of land-use change is critical for water management in semi-arid areas, due to its effects on the hydrological cycle. In the U.S. Southwest, fallowing farmland has become one strategy to reduce water use. Previous to this study, the magnitude and location of changes in fallowing have not been studied in depth. Using the 30-meter Cropland Data Layer, this study assessed the spatial and temporal patterns of fallowing in the U.S. portion of the Rio Grande/Río Bravo Basin (RGB) at three spatial scales (basin, state, and ecoregion) between 2008 and 2018. Our results do not show evidence of an increasing trend in fallowing at the basin level. However, the spatio-temporal patterns differed considerably among states and ecoregions, revealing hotspots of fallowing. By showing that land fallowing is not a widespread practice across the basin, our findings indicate that the potential of this strategy to save water has been underused.