Assessing policy influences on people’s relationship to water ecosystem services: The South African experience

Water resources policy in South Africa is at the forefront of international policies toward the protection of water ecosystem services. However, in spite of many innovative approaches, 10 years after these approaches were included into policy, many of these ideas have yet to operationalised. This Policy and Practice paper tries to unpack some of the underlying reasons for this. It is hoped, that this will provide useful pointers for IIED's assignment to scope a possible DFID Research Programme on Freshwater Ecosystem Services and Poverty Reduction.