'Economy of Use' in the 1997 UN Convention on Shared Watercourses : An Attempt at Elucidation

Article 6(5) of the 1997 United Nations ("UN") Convention on the Non-Navigable Uses of International Watercourses lists "economy of use" as one of the factors to determine the reasonable and equitable use of the waters of shared international watercourses. But, as used in the Convention, the phrase is ambiguous, and a more precise definition is desirable. The treaty and academic commentary suggest that the meaning of the obligation of "economy of use" is restricted to avoiding unnecessary wastage and achieving the best possible efficiency standards subject to resource constraints. This understanding is more precise but still less onerous than might be desired in the context of an impending water crisis. Support for a more onerous and more precise obligation is sought from an exhaustive survey of state practice, including 471 international instruments ranging from the mid-nineteenth century to the present. These instruments fail to support a more precise or onerous obligation. They do, however, permit the determination of a five-point spectrum of efficiency-related obligations, of which proscription against negligence (the current understanding) is only the least onerous, and the most onerous is use of efficiency as an allocative criterion (unused in state practice). The intervening points on the spectrum are cooperation towards specific efficiency goals, unilateral efficiency requirements, and open-ended cooperation (all finding varying degrees of acceptance in state practice). The reluctance of states to embrace and delineate precise efficiency-related obligations is a function of political reluctance more than practical difficulty, but this reluctance is bound to be revised in the very near future in the face of acute water shortages