Explore data from Latin America.
Examine the extent to which national-level legal frameworks recognize the freshwater rights of Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples, and local communities in Latin America through distinct “community-based water tenure regimes” (CWTRs). To learn more about community-based tenure rights in Latin America, see RRI’s Forest Tenure Data.
6 countries and 20 Community-based Water Tenure Regimes:
Half of the total CWTRs identified in this analysis stem from the national laws of 6 Latin American countries.
Latin American CWTRs were least frequently characterized by a land-water nexus—although in several Latin American CWTRs where water rights are not dependent on land rights, water rights still receive the strongest protections within legally recognized community lands—and exhibited the lowest recognition of Indigenous Peoples’, Afro-descendant Peoples’, and local communities’ rights to sell, lease, or otherwise transfer freshwater rights.
All 20 CWTRs within these countries recognize Indigenous Peoples’, Afro-descendant Peoples’, and/or local communities’ rights to use water for both domestic and cultural/religious purposes in perpetuity.
Latin America Performance (Threshold Questions & Legal Indicators)
For 6 countries in Latin America, RRI maintains detailed qualitative data on the strength of Water Tenure rights legally held by Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples, and local communities. Learn more about RRI’s Water Tenure Methodology.
These questions evaluate elements of legally recognized freshwater rights that impact all people within a given country and that strongly influence the strength and security of community-based freshwater rights.
CWTR-level threshold questions provide critical context within which the bundle of freshwater rights held by Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendants, local communities, and women in those communities should be understood.
The methodology assesses five legal indicators—use, transferability, exclusion, governance, and domestic due process and compensation—along with associated sub-indicators for each identified CWTR.