Jean-Mathieu Bloch
email: blochjm@hotmail.com

The importance of context and stakeholders in a public participation process Case study in the region of Limassol in Cyprus By

Cyprus is facing environmental problems, aquifer depletion and water scarcity. The government tries to recharge an aquifer with recycled water but due to the reluctance of the local communities the project was not implemented. The EU project AquaStress in cooperation with the Water Development Department, in charge of executing the water policy, intends through a participative approach to find collective solutions to the problems. The aquifer recharge with recycled water was considered as an option in the project. After few meetings occurred, the participatory process stopped. A holistic study including a stakeholder analysis and a public participative evaluation helped to confirm some factors contributing to the process stalling. The complex legislation inherited from history confined mayors as main decision maker on their boundaries. Unfortunately they were not involved in the process as well as their interest were not covered by the project theme, focused on agriculture. Furthermore the big role played by the Water Development Department in the project preparation created, for some participants, a link with AquaStress, and generated its overrepresentation in the process. If a consideration would have been given to the understanding of structural problems and of the factors giving rise to conflicts of interest, the influence caused by some of these factors on the process could have been reduced.

INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background

Cyprus is facing environmental problems and water scarcity. These problems are further increased by the traditional inclination of Cyprus towards agriculture and the tourism industry which creates competing water demands for domestic and agricultural purposes. According to Apostolaki and Assimacopoulos "most of these problems arise from prolonged drought, the increase of demand, a not fully effective water management caused by the existing water legislation and fragmentation of jurisdiction, the water pricing system especially between groundwater and surface water form government waterworks and slack enforcement of groundwater extraction control due to staff limitations and complex legal procedures." (Apostolaki, Assimacopoulos, 2006).

The area of Limassol, located in the southern part of Cyprus, is a typical reflection of this situation where the domestic (including tourism) and agricultural sectors' demands are generating aquifer depletion and conflicts in water uses. Thus to augment its available supplies the government has turned to add non-conventional water such as tertiary treated effluent for the agriculture's irrigation. However a part of the production of treated water is rejected during the winter into the sea and cannot be stored in the aquifer due to the reluctance of local municipalities which use the aquifer for domestic purposes. The government cannot enforce the decision because the place of discharge is located within the boundaries of a British military area1 , where the Cypriot government has no jurisdiction.

To address this problem and following the EU Water Framework Directive, the government of Cyprus has integrated a participatory component in this water management approach. The EU project AquaStress2 in Limassol pursues the same goal. According to Bogliotti and Assimacopoulos "It aims, towards the real needs of stakeholders in relation to water stress and its implication at the social, economic, environmental and governance dimensions, to strengthen their participation and involvement in the deliberation of goals and activities related to a sustainable water stress management" (Bogliotti, Assimacopoulos, 2005). In the framework of AquaStress, and in cooperation with the Cypriot Water Development Department3 , a stakeholder process was attempted. However, after some meetings the process became inactive.

Purpose

The purpose of this article is to investigate the factors that were relevant for the process to become stalled and how in future processes in a similar context this could be avoided. At the same time, the article will highlight the relevance of a stakeholder analysis for a public participation process in an integrated project of water resources management.

Definitions

To substantiate the research done, a clarification of different terms present within this article needed to be carried out. Based on a restricted literature research, the concepts used in his article could be defined as follow.

Integrated water resources management (IWRM)

According to the UNDP "IWRM is a process which promotes the co-ordinated development and management of water, land and related resources, in order to maximize the resultant economic and social welfare in an equitable manner without compromising the sustainability of vital ecosystems." 4 It involves the coordinated management of water, land, and environmental resources, taking into account all interests, interested bodies, users and uses, and their physical and cultural needs, while is aiming at preventing further environmental degradation and at promoting the restoration of degraded resources».

Stakeholder analysis

According to Grimble, "the general purpose of SA may be seen as a methodology for understanding environmental and development problems and interactions through comparative analysis of the different perspectives and sets of interest of stakeholders at various levels. SA can be defined as a holistic approach or procedure for gaining an understanding of a system, and assessing the impact of changes to that system, by means of identifying the key actors or stakeholders and assessing their respective interests in the system. The term 'stakeholders' mean any group of people, organised or unorganised, who share a common interest or stake in a particular issue or system; they can be at any level or position in society, from global, national and regional concerns down to the level of household or intra-household, and be groups of any size or aggregation." (Grimble, 1996)

Public participation

Von Korff's research showed the following: "Broadly speaking, public participation seems to be widely understood (see Rowe and Frewer 2005, 253) as a process (also called a 'practice' or 'procedure') by which people who are not elected or appointed decision makers (i.e. the 'public') engage (i.e. 'participate') with these officials on agenda-setting and/ or decision-making on issues and policies that affect them or that interest them. Participation itself has been specified by differentiating the various levels in which power is delegated to members of the public. The lowest two levels of power-delegation are often called 'information' (where officials convey messages to the public such as in newsletters or briefings), and 'consultation' (where input is sought from the public such as in surveys, focus groups, or public hearings). Above this, two-way communication between the public and officials occurs and terms such as 'active involvement', or 'active participation' and others are used. » (Von Korff, 2007)

METHODOLOGY

Five months were spent in the study's area 5 , this time was necessary to create a climate of trust between some of the stakeholder and the author. The strategy for data collection and analysis was based on both semi-structured and narrative interviews, mostly at the working place of the stakeholders or at in coffee shops 6 , in order for the interviewees to feel comfortable. These interviews were held, with the help of a translator, mostly in Greek and sometimes English. The study started with the observation of the physical system followed with the understanding of the agriculture and the water management context through an historical approach held at three scales: fields, villages and region. Farmers were met at random in the fields or at the coffee shop while communities' representatives and water managers were met in their offices 7 . Special attention was given to the interactions between the stakeholders involved or affected by water management issues. However, Cyprus is a closed society and many people will provide relevant information only after significant trust building. The difficulty to meet all the key stakeholders and to identify the major interests and interactions between them was limited by this constraint. Nevertheless, the stakeholder analysis has helped to understand the context, to compare the interests of each stakeholder, to identify the conflicts of interests between them and finally investigate the explicative factors which slowed down the process.

Stakeholder analysis approach

There are different ways to realize a stakeholder analysis. Inspired by the works of Grimble (1995) and Mayers (2001), who established both guidelines to conduct a stakeholder analysis, the following steps have been used:

7 A special effort was made to meet a maximum of stakeholders within the boundaries of the study's area: around 30 farmers, mayors from the villages of Episkopi, Erimi, Kolossi, Akrotiri, Ypsonas and Trachoni, governmental agencies from the region (Water Development Department, Agriculture Department, Sewerage and Water Board of Limassol…).

Identify the purpose of the analysis (objectives and boundaries) and a holistic understanding of the system

Identify key stakeholders who are essential to the analysis, and that they are likely to affect or to be affected by the way in which the project will be implemented.

Investigate stakeholders' interests, characteristics, circumstances, and the influences between stakeholders (institutional/organisational factors and

Individual motivation factors

Identify patterns and contexts of interaction between stakeholders. Understand the relationships between stakeholders, conflict or cooperation, reasons.

Assess stakeholders' power to control decisions and potential to affect, or to be affected by them (a point stressed especially by Mayers, 2001).

Use the findings to make progress

CemOA : archive ouverte d'Irstea / Cemagref

Public participation evaluation

Once the local context and the regional water management situation known, the public participation process accompanied by the AquaStress project was evaluated. The aim was to analyze the factors which stopped the public participation process of the project. The sample of interviewees concerned 12 stakeholders that participated in at least in one of the three meetings held for the Aquastress project on the public participation process and that came to the knowledge of this author. The stakeholders were chosen8 in a such way that they represent the whole range of the stakeholders involved in this process, involving governmental parties, mayors of the area involved, farmer organizations-political organisation, farmers and environmental organizations. More specifically a set of predetermined questions were presented, however flexibility was made as for the modification of their content depending on the interviewees and on the subjects for the discussion. Primarily questions of open type were used following a guideline questionnaire inspired from criteria established by Beierle and Konisky (2000) for the assessment of the context and Rowe, Marsh and Frewer (2001) for the assessment of the process.

There were considerable difficulties in collecting information concerning the organisation of the stakeholder process meetings attempted by AquaStress as some of those responsible for setting up the meeting chose not to provide information. This has created a limit in the realisation of this evaluation. Nevertheless, even with this partial mosaic of data, the main factors contributing to the stalling of the process could be identified, though some question marks remain with regard to their validity.

RESULTS

Process

Despite the mentioned difficulties in accessing data, information about three meetings was available from various meeting minutes9 . These meetings were organised on site by the local representative of AquaStress, the Aeoliki Foundation10 , helped by the Water Development Department and the international team from AquaStress.

In July 2005, a so-called Info Day meeting was held in Nicosia for three days. The topic of this meeting was to make a presentation of the AquaStress project in general and more specifically what it could do in Cyprus. It aimed to introduce the stakeholders to the goals of the project, its innovative elements and methodology and an AquaStress roadmap for Cyprus. At this stage a 'core group' of stakeholders had already been decided upon, the adaptation of AquaStress with the local needs was realized with a preliminary consultation and a planning for future work was established. The 'core group' was composed by the Water Development Department, the Sewerage Board of Limassol-Amathus, the Water Board of Limassol, the University of Cyprus, the Union of Limassol Communities, the Cyprus Green Party, the Limassol Chamber of Commerce and Industry, two Unions of Cypriot Farmers and Lanitis Farm11 . The main outcomes of this day were that:

-Cyprus has a centralised system in water management which creates a gap in communication between authorities and users;

-One of the main issues in Cyprus is the reluctance of the public to use recycled water in agriculture;

-The stakeholders expect from AquaStress to assist them in informing the public in relation to water issues in the area, especially on the issue of using recycled water;

-The Water Development Department does not have the expertise to support public awareness attempts and is asking the help of AquaStress to do it; -Public participation is not a common practice in Cyprus; people are not interested in participating in meetings. They have to be convinced on the benefits of participating, they have to see the outcomes in connection with their interests.

In December 2005 a process planning meeting was held in Limassol with the stakeholders. "The objective of this meeting was to start discussing collectively some issues of water management in the western Limassol area and to raise some scenarios of planning and local action" (Ferrand, 2005). The selected topic of the meeting was what to do with treated effluent, the geographical scope was Episkopi area and the expected outcome was to have a recommendation of the stakeholder group regarding the process to choose. A specific process was proposed to the group, namely a process foreseeing a public participation process (a consensus conference) on the question of the treated waste water. The representative of Episkopi's mayor didn't agree and left the meeting after lunch.

During the year 2006, the local representative of AquaStress consulted the municipalities' representative and the stakeholder group, but no data could be on obtained on their issues.

Nevertheless, it appears that the local representative made a great effort to get the various mayors together and to involve them in the process.

In November 2006, a Local Participation Stakeholder Forum (LPSF) meeting, the last one, was held in Limassol. This meeting was focused on the issue of treated wastewater use. The first objective of this workshop was to share the points of view of the different stakeholder involved in this issue. The stakeholders invited to this workshop were on the one hand the local mayors (that are mostly against the use of treated wastewater to recharge the aquifer in their area), and on the other hand the managers and other governmental representatives that are in favour of this solution. The other objectives of the workshop were to let the stakeholder analyse what their perspectives have in common and where are differences, to have a perspective for the next meetings and to move forward in the process. None12 of the representatives of the communities that are against the use of treated wastewater for recharging the aquifer did come.

Different factors can explain the stalling of the process. Some are linked to the process itself, some others are linked to the special context of Cyprus and/or some with the stakeholders.

Thereafter the author will try to analyse the process to underline the factor which could be responsible for the process inactivity. After, these factors will be linked with the context and the stakeholders to demonstrate their influence in the implementation of the process.

Analysis of the process

The question of the mayors' involvement in the process During the December 2005 meeting, the Episkopi's representative (the only municipalities' representative present) didn't agree with the meeting's topic of recycled water issues and left the meeting. He declared that «he would participate to the next meetings only if the other mayors from the area would be there» 13 . The idea that the mayors' participation in the process was an important issue is strengthened with the effort from the organisers to involve them in future meetings. Nevertheless despite these efforts, the others mayors never came to the next meeting in November 2006. It looks like the mayors were not interested in participating in the meetings.

A focus on the issue of treated water

The three meetings' minutes mentioned as topic the treated water. The first meeting's minute mentioned the reluctance of the public to use recycled water while the second and third meetings where focused in the issue of the treated water use. The third meeting's minute specifies a categorisation of stakeholders 14 by differentiating their opinion regarding the recharge of the aquifer with treated water, one of the main options considered by the project.

This topic of recharging aquifer with recycled water generated after three meetings conflicts of objectives between two distinct stakeholders: governmental parties and communities' representatives. This point is confirmed with the participants interviewed 15 where 10 out of 12 participants could feel the presence of conflicts of interests between the participants during the meetings.

Indeed the different parties involved don't have the same interest regarding the theme selected for the project (agriculture). This situation is to be linked with the interests of the mayors to participate to the process. Furthermore with the high land transfer demand from agricultural to constructible zone, the agriculture tends to be on the decline 16 and may not be considered for everybody as attractive to participate in a process where the issue is the aquifer recharge with recycled water 17 .

The important position of the water development department in AquaStress

The Water Development Department has played a significant role in cooperation with the local organiser of AquaStress in the preparation of the project, in the identification of the theme of research based on the agriculture sector and in the localisation of the research. The context's study will stress out that the option of recharging the aquifer with recycled water was considered by the government since the construction of the sewerage plant in 1995, and was always rejected by the local municipalities. Indeed it could be legitimist to wonder if AquaStress has not been drawn up by the Water Development Department to make realised their project of recharging the aquifer with recycled water. It was seen like this by a key 13 Quotation from a discussion between the Episkopi's representative and a member of AquaStress 14 «The stakeholders invited to this workshop were on the one hand the local communities (that are against the use of treated wastewater to recharge the aquifer in their area), and on the other hand the managers and other governmental representatives that are in favour of this solution» Dionnet M, First Cyprus LPSF Workshop & JWT meeting, Mission Report, Internal document, AquaStress, November 2006 15 Participants interviews in the frame of the public participation evaluation 16 There is a difference of land value from one to five between agricultural and constructible plot. 17 Recharging the aquifer with recycled water would reduce the selling value of the constructible plot.

stakeholder: the Episkopi's representative declared during an interview that «I could figure out that the local organiser Aeoliki was very close with the WDD during the meeting»18 .

Furthermore a local mediator which was employed for some months by the local representative of the AquaStress project was a former WDD employee. It could have attempted his neutrality in the process.

The overrepresentation of the governmental parties in the process

The importance of the Water Development Department in AquaStress reduced its neutrality in the process and could be seen as an empowerment situation of the government in the process.

The figures below shows that the governmental parties present in the two last meetings were much stronger represented than the other parties involved. This situation was increased by the absence of the municipalities' representative and by the absence of all stakeholders affected by the water management on site (English base, farmers, citizens, touristic industry…). All the non governmental participants regretted their lack of information before the meetings 19 . The unfair information's detention from all participants, exacerbated with the important Water Development Department's role in the project, created a process where the lack of preparation from the 'reluctant' could have been considered by the Water Development Department as an advantage. A big farmer present at every meeting declared «everything was made to be convinced to accept the government's project»20 .

A problem of trust

All the non governmental parties interviewed declared not to place any trust in the governmental parties21 . This factor is partly the result of a history process issued from the Water Development Department's willingness to take over all the water management in the area.

Moreover as pointed out during the info day, participative process is new in Cyprus, and half of the participants (mostly non governmental parties) declared the reluctance from the governmental parties present to act in a participative way. The regional responsible from the Water Development Department in Limassol declared during an interview «we can speak with local people but the final decision belongs to us»22 .

All the points described above are strongly linked to each other in their contribution to the process stalling. The mayors were not considered as crucial stakeholders in the process, thus were not invited to participate as such. When the organisers acknowledged the omission, they made an effort to involve the mayors to participate. Unfortunately these latter's interests were not covered by the process as well they could feel a power situation from the WDD in the project, sentiment also shared by the other participants. There is also to consider if all the stakeholders found an interest, strong enough to participate to the process, process focused on agriculture. Furthermore in a context where the participants have little trust in the government the neutrality, essential in a participatory process, was strongly compromised and strengthened by the affiliation of the local mediator to the WDD. Finally we have to wonder if the Water Development Department was really open to a participatory process.

These factors mixed all together reduced the efficiency of reaching a successful process: conflicts of interests, lack of trust, lack of information, overrepresentation. The next parts will introduce the area's context and stakeholders in order to understand, from a holistic point of view, the points described above. Thus, the specific data described in the process analysis will be weighted.

Context

Water resources and demand today

The water resources of Limassol area are divided into three watersheds: Germasoya river and aquifer, Polemidhia river and Garyllis aquifer, and Kouris river and Akrotiri aquifer. All three are supplied by the rainfall and the runoff from the Troodos Mountains located in center of the island and considered as the water tower of Cyprus.

The considerable reduction of mean annual rainfall in the island (the decrease in the Limassol region is of the order of 60-80 mm and it is observed mainly in December and January 23 ) had restricted the inflow to the dams and reduced the infiltration into the aquifers.

Figure 4: table of mean annual rainfall for Cyprus (WDD, 2003)

Furthermore, frequent droughts have reduced the direct and indirect groundwater recharge; construction of dams resulted in reduced recharge of the downstream aquifers. At the same time farmers, in their effort to maintain agricultural production levels have continued extracting the same quantities of groundwater and in most cases have even greatly increased these quantities. All these adverse conditions resulted in saline water intrusion and hence quality deterioration of coastal aquifers and the depletion of inland aquifers 24 . More specifically in our area it appears that the Kouris aquifer is subject to water intrusion, the Water Development Department tries since the 80's to stabilize the extraction for irrigation purpose from this aquifer.

In the meantime the water demand from all sectors is in constant increase 25 and is mainly concentrated during the summer season which is characterised by the high demand of water from the touristic and agricultural sectors.

Despite a government policy of controlling the demand (price regulation) and the offer these different situations had force the Water Development Department to focus its policy on new "water management approaches now consider storing only amounts of water that do not affect the recharge of aquifers downstream of the dams, and that prevent saline intrusion in the coastal aquifers, and include a large contribution to the demand from non-conventional water resources such as recycled water and desalination of seawater" (Apostolaki and Assimacopoulos, 2006, pp118). For the latter, a desalinisation plant is to be built in the area of Akrotiri in 2012. For the former, city of Limassol has since 1995 a sewerage plant which collects individual waste water in the city, and after treatment can be used for irrigation of defined crops 26 . 23 Nevertheless, due to the constant production of treated water within the year and due to the seasonality of the demand for it (agriculture's demand for irrigation water is mainly concentrated the summer) it appears that, even if a small part of the production is stored in a dam, a third of the production is rejected into the sea the winter27 . This problem of partial use of the treated water will be further increased in the next years with the extension of the treatment capacity of treated water in the area (which should be extended from 6 to 12 millions tons until 2017). The Water Development Department had considered, in its policy to augment its available supplies, to recharge the Akrotiri aquifer with treated water the winter. Going in that sense, drainage basins were constructed in 1995 by the Water Development Department in the Akrotiri riverbed. However, these drainage basins were not used due to objections of the local inhabitants. "The main argument against the use of the treated effluent to recharge the aquifers is that the aquifers can be used for domestic purposes. And the Government cannot enforce the decision as the place is in the British Base Area" (Apostolaki & Assimacopoulos, 2006, pp137-141). Today Cyprus is divided into 3 distinct territories under distinct jurisdictions: English with their military bases in various locations, Turkish in the North of the Island and Cypriot in the South. The area of the study, in the southern part of the island, is legally divided into two boundaries: English base and Cypriot land; is located in the western part of the area of Limassol; and is composed by the villages of Episkopi, Erimi, Kolossi, Trachoni, and Akrotiri. Most of the villages studied are located on the border between the 2 boundaries and respond to two legislations.

Legal and geographical complexities inherited from history

All these facts created a difference on the land tenure:

-the lands which are situated within the British boundaries are not in a constructible zone so most of these lands are agricultural lands, -the lands in the Cypriot boundaries are either agricultural or constructible zones. The high value of constructible lands implies the high demand for land conversion from agriculture into constructible, -some of the lands are still owned by Turkish -Cypriot; most of these lands are exploited and rented by Cypriot refugees used as agriculture lands. On those land any exchange and constructions is not allowed.

This possible exchange of lands from agricultural into constructible represents a high stake for the land owners. As Limassol area is one the main touristic place in Cyprus and gets the second agricultural position of the island 28 , most of local people 29 are wishing to transfer their land to profit from the high land value difference. Regarding the aquifer recharge with recycled water they have a difference of interests with refugees 30 .

This situation in combination with the legal and geographical complexities created various conflicts. Conflicts are rising between refugees and local people on the question of treated water. Conflicts also exist between the agriculture and the touristic sectors as well: for the land tenure, transfers from agricultural land to constructible, aquifer recharge with treated water, competition in the water consummation and allocation….

Concerning the water allocation, the government prioritized the domestic sectors, including tourism to the agricultural and industrial sectors. Nevertheless domestic water is managed locally on site while irrigation water is centrally managed by the government.

Water management Irrigation water

The government has a bigger influence on the management of the water used for irrigation and we observe plenty of governmental departments acting in this field. This importance of the government is to link with historical facts in the study area.

During the 15 th century , a network of canals from the Kouris river was providing water to all the agricultural land around. This system was still in active, in addition with few improvements, until the middle of last century. During this time locals owned the water rights from the river. The water titles were separated documents from the land titles. Even if the majority of these rights were hold by the Greek orthodox and the Turkish religions, farmers owned some water rights. A system of exchange was available; it was possible to rent water rights and eventually to buy them for one year. All these arrangements and the maintenance of the canals were under the supervision and the control of a local committee, which was also under the supervision of the Governor of Limassol. This local committee was democratically elected by the water rights owners.

The first boreholes appeared in the 1950's, when the river flow started to decline Nevertheless the boreholes were only used during the summer time-a period without precipitation. Some of the boreholes were private and some were administrated with the same management system as the river.

During the 1980's the government constructed the Kouris dam, and the Water Development Department bought the water rights from their owners and started its 'water centralisation'. From this time, and apart from some private and illegal boreholes, the government started to manage almost all the irrigation's water, which is mostly coming from their own infrastructures. Nevertheless, "the Institutional set up as now existing is a rather complex and bureaucratic system made up of at least four involved Ministries on the policy level, 15 Government Departments on the executive level" 31 . 28 In terms of number of farmers and of cultivated lands. Cf. Census of agriculture 2006, statistical service, Ministry of agriculture of Cyprus Republic. 29 People originally from the area own the lands while Cypriots refugees from the North rent their lands. 30 recharging the aquifer with recycled water would reduce the land value of the constructible lands and would be prejudicial for the land owners growers would profit a cheaper price for the irrigation water extracted from the aquifer 31 Apostolaki S., Assimacopoulos D., Deliverable 1.2-3, Report feedback survey to WB2, AquaStress, p.141

Potable water

The management of the drinking water belongs at the local level to the municipalities and at the regional level to the Water Development Department, in charge to estimate the needs and to distribute it to the communities. At the local level, villages and cities manage themselves the pricing, distribution and the sale of the drinking water. The water can come from the communities' boreholes and/or from governmental water works. In the latter the communities buy the water to the Water Development Department, dependant from the agriculture ministry. If the communities extract the water from their boreholes, the only intervention of the government concerns the certification of the drinkability of the water. The return value of potable water sales goes back to the communities and is reinvested in it.

The evolution of the water management in the past had concentrated a part of the management in the hands of the government and a part in the hands of the local communities. This dual management of the resource can become for some specific issues, such as recharging the aquifer with treated water, a source of objective's disharmony between these two entities.

Stakeholders

The next part will situate the stakeholder's interests and interactions in the frame of the water management on site, its history, the water availability and the land tenure (i.e. the context), and their expression during the participative meetings (i.e. the process).

Stakeholders involved and/or affected by the water management

The stakeholders involved and/or affected by the water management need to be specified32 . The stakeholders are separated between the consumers (farmers, industry and citizens) and the water managers at the municipalities' level (communities and the Limassol water board) and regional level (Water Development Department). The Sewerage Board of Limassol-Amathus (SALA) has a technical role of collecting and treating the waste water of Limassol, under contract with the Water Development Department and will be assimilated to it.

Stakeholders' interests

Each of these previous stakeholders has, following its own interests, different objectives and influences on the others. The next table 33 indicates for the key stakeholders their objective and power to influence another group. Farmers are looking for the profitability of their agricultural activities and for getting enough water for their crops. However if their land is transferred into constructible most of the land owners (i.e. the local farmers) would stop or reduce their activities to construct or to sell their lands. The big farms are pursuing the same goal and would start touristic activities (golf…) if their lands become constructible. Regarding their influence on other groups, the big farmers because of their economic weight have an institutional influence on the government and on the WDD, while the smaller farmers have a small influence on their communities' representative.

The communities representative are seeking for their re-election, they are favourable to land transfer into constructible and think that of agriculture will be reduced to hobby farming in the future 34 . They want also to keep their local management of potable water 35 . They have a small influence on government, by personal contact or political affiliation, but no direct influence on the Water Development Department. Nevertheless, it could happen that indirectly the communities' representative can put pressure on the WDD. The author assisted to a deal between the Water Development Department and the Episkopi mayor resulting from a pressure on the government. To approve the construction of a desalinisation plant into their boundaries, Episkopi could negotiate with the national government the removal of the water restriction for irrigation issued by the Water Development Department.

On the other side the regional water managers want to save water by recharging the Akrotiri aquifer with treated water. They are also looking for extending their control on every local water resources. Furthermore as managers for irrigation's water they have a big influence on the farmers36 .

The stakeholders have many differences of interests between them: agriculture, transfers into tourism, power on the management, environment protection, re-elections... The influence on stakeholders in mainly institutional and is resulting from a top-down process: managers got influence on farmers and citizens…. Apart from personal contacts in the government and for the tourism industry the top down structure is rarely changed. The only inversion from topdown concerns the issue of the aquifer recharge with treated water where the municipalities' representatives have the power to decide on that issue. This situation of interests' variations between the stakeholders caused conflicts between groups which could be felt during the process. The conflicts are described below.

The recurrent conflict observed during the process concerned the recycled water issues ans specifically the question of the aquifer recharge with treated water. This conflict is visible almost between every party and especially between the governmental parties and the communities' representatives. This opposition represents one of the main important factors of process' stalling as the mayors as final decision-maker in their boundaries didn't show up in the last meeting.

Furthermore the Water Development Department is also in conflict, because of interests' differences, with almost all the other groups: conflicts with mayors on the future question for the local water management, conflicts with farmers for the water allocation decided unilaterally by the Water Development Department… Linked with the important position played by the water development department in the project and in the process, it biased the project neutrality and largely contributed to the process stalling.

CONCLUSION:

The Water Development Department with the topic of raising its available water resources has considered the recharge of the aquifer with treated water. However such recharge didn't work out due to the reluctance of the mayors of the area, which use the aquifer for domestic purposes. With a complex legislation inherited from history, the government can't enforce the situation: the place of discharge is located into the English boundaries and the final decision is under the mayors' responsibility. Furthermore, from the middle of last century, the government water centralisation and the recent restrictions for irrigation were accompanied with a sentiment of non trust developed from farmers towards the Water Development Department. Gradually this sentiment started to be extended to the communities' representatives with the Water development Department's expectation from to control local domestic water management.

The project AquaStress came in the middle of this unknown situation, compromising its neutral position towards the stakeholders because of his cooperation with the Water Development Department. Thus the consideration of water stresses reduction in the area by stressing out options related to recycled water issues exacerbated the uncomfortable position of AquaStress. When the project defined for theme of discussion the issue of treated water the affiliation of AquaStress to the Water Development Department aroused some of the mayors' suspicion and was strengthened with the overrepresentation of the Water Development Department within the meetings. However the mayors' involvement was forgotten in the start of the process and in case of they would have been included; the project's theme had no interest for most them, as well as it didn't reach fully the interests of some of the other participants.

It makes the author wonder if AquaStress was not drawn up by the water development to make a success out of this project of aquifer recharge from the water development department, which was always refused by the local communities. Furthermore it highlights the importance of the context and the stakeholders in an external environmental project implementation.

This extreme situation of Cyprus where a participation component, integrated in a water stress reduction project, is stalled is a typical reflection of the necessity to understand the context upstream from a project. It underlines the high necessity of a good acknowledgement of the area. This analysis should have included a stakeholders' identification, the stakeholders' interests, the existing conflicts and eventual resolutions, the area's history, the stakes, the perspectives, and the local decision makers' identification as well. All these upstream analysis should prepare to avoid former conflicts, to have a local process' legitimating and participation with a theme accepted by every stakeholder. Stakeholder and context analyses are required upstream from a participatory process.

In other words in participatory approaches, apart a focus in developing collective procedures, a consideration has to be given to understand and to deal with structural problems and with the factors giving rise to conflicts of interest. It shows that only increasing the participation doesn't guarantee a successful participatory project but that acknowledge of the environment is highly required. According to Grimble "For projects to work, the interests of the whole range of stakeholders who can influence or be influenced by the project or policy need to be taken into account, and compromises need to be actively sought between public objectives and potentially conflicting private stakeholder interests and objectives. While encouraging the participation of the range of stakeholders in cooperative decision-making and management may be one way of doing this, participatory methods in themselves cannot guarantee success" (Grimble and al, 1997).

In the particular case of Cyprus the participatory process is restorable if the project defined a new theme which covers the interests of every stakeholder. The global theme of tourism development -agriculture perspective -environment could be considered. Furthermore the project needs to be legitimate by all the stakeholders. Such process would attract them to participate in the project and to be active in it. The presence of a neutral local mediator should be necessary to carry out such process and to make equal information diffusion between all the stakeholders. At last, the Water Development department should be inquired about his ability to act in a participatory way. If it is not the case, the project should involve a party with more institutional influence than the water development department. Nevertheless it highlights the efforts to implement participatory projects for natural resource management in general and in top-down decision making countries in particular.

Figure 1 :

 1 Figure 1: research's area (WDD, 2005)

Figure 2 :

 2 Figure 2: representation of the stakeholders during the December 2005 meeting (total 29 participants)

Figure 5 :

 5 Figure 5: introduction to the stakeholders

Figure 3: representation of the stakeholders during the November 2006 meeting (total 8 participants)

	NGO
	9%
	union farmers
	9%
	farmers
	9%
	Municipalities' representative	government
	4%	56%
	union communities
	4%
	research inst.
	9%
	NGO; 12,50%
	farmer; 12,50%
		Government; 50%
	Union communities; 12,50%
	Former Erimi's mayor; 12,50%

Figure 6: table of objectives and influence

	Stakeholders	Main objective	Influence on stakeholders
	Refugees farmers	profitability, enough water for low cost	Small influence on communities' representative
	Local farmers	profitability, enough water for low cost, land transfer into constructible	Small influence on communities' representative
		tourism, profitability, enough	Influence on government (by
	Big farmers	water for low cost, land transfer	personal contact because of
		into constructible	their economic weight)
	Tourism industry	profitability	Influence on government
			Small influence on government
		re-election, land transfer into	(by personal contact),
	Communities' representative	constructible, to keep their local	no influence on WDD
		management of potable water	Influence on the recharge of
			aquifer
	Water Development Department	water saving, recharge aquifer with treated water, to extend their water management on	Influence on farmers (institutional power)
		potable water
	Sewerage board and Limassol	water saving, recharge aquifer	Influence on farmers
	Water board	with treated water	(institutional power)
	Government	Re-election	Influence on WDD (institutional power)

Despite the independence of Cyprus in 1970 the English kept a presence on the island with some military bases disseminated in various locations, these bases are under English jurisdiction.

http://www.aquastress.net

The Water Development Department is responsible for implementing the water policy of the Ministry of Agriculture, Natural Resources and environment of Cyprus.

www.europeandcis.undp.org/WaterWiki/images/a/a5/GWPIWRM.pdf

In the western part of Limassol CemOA : archive ouverte d'Irstea / Cemagref

Special attention was given to the Episkopi's community whose representative participated to one project meeting before he decided not to participate anymore. Furthermore the place from the governmental project to discharge the recycled water in the aquifer is located into the Episkopi's boundaries.

These minutes were written by some members from Aquastress (Glekas for the info day, Von Korff for the one held in December 2005 and Dionnet for the one in November 2006) ) which came on site to observe and help in the organisation of the meetings.

Aeoliki Foundation is an environmental and Energy management consultancy based in Nicosia, it is the Cyprus regional partner of AquaStress.CemOA : archive ouverte d'Irstea / Cemagref

Lanitis Farm is one of the main big farms active in the area. They cultivate on 600 hectares of citrus and are exporters.

Out of the 7 villages from the area, no representative did come. Only the former mayor of Erimi was present but it seems he was there as a farmer and not as Erimi's representative. CemOA : archive ouverte d'Irstea / Cemagref

CemOA : archive ouverte d'Irstea / Cemagref

Quotation from an interview about the meeting of December 2005with the Episkopi's representative.CemOA : archive ouverte d'Irstea / Cemagref

The five non government's representatives, due their non information about the process objective and the absence of working document, were criticising their lack of preparation before the meetings.

Quotation from an interview with a Lanitis farm's representative.

Out of 12 participants interviewed the 5 non government's representatives declared not to place any trust in the government on the scientific data presented during the process.

Quotation from a Water Development Department regional's representative interview.CemOA : archive ouverte d'Irstea / Cemagref

Data from an interview with the Director of the Sewerage plant of Limassol-Amtahus CemOA : archive ouverte d'Irstea / Cemagref

The stakeholders involved in the political and national levels are introduced here but will not be taken into consideration in the stakeholder analysis because the research was concentrated at the regional and executive level.CemOA : archive ouverte d'Irstea / Cemagref

The data presented and commented are based on the interviews made by the author with the stakeholders.

According to some interviews with the communities' representatives.

For the communities the extraction and the sale of water to their citizen is a big source of profit because they establish themselves the prices and the water's sales stay into the community.CemOA : archive ouverte d'Irstea / Cemagref

In case of annual water scarcity, according to the availability and after serving the domestic sector, the Water Development Department reduces the water's allocation for irrigation. In 2007, 40% of the citrus needs were offered.CemOA : archive ouverte d'Irstea / Cemagref

Conflicts between groups Figure 7: table of conflicts between key stakeholders

LIST OF FIGURES: