To a large extend I agree with Fred Pearce. I made a study in Peru about the effect of a large scale dam + a river diversion in the livelihood of poor peasants (depending of that river). Here the results in short:
- overrun investment, impossible to recover it.
- Although it gained some new agricultural lands, it also salinized fertile agriucltural lands (downstream)
- It dried water sources of many rural communities
- The irrigation of one hectare of the new agricultural land, implies the drying of 3 hectares of the fertile land of poor peasants.
- Ecological disaster downstream the diverted river
- Migration of poor peasants and sell of their wage labour in the newly subsidized agricultural lands, etc.
To a large extend I agree with Fred Pearce. I made a study in Peru about the effect of a large scale dam + a river diversion in the livelihood of poor peasants (depending of that river). Here the results in short:
- overrun investment, impossible to recover it.
- Although it gained some new agricultural lands, it also salinized fertile agriucltural lands (downstream)
- It dried water sources of many rural communities
- The irrigation of one hectare of the new agricultural land, implies the drying of 3 hectares of the fertile land of poor peasants.
- Ecological disaster downstream the diverted river
- Migration of poor peasants and sell of their wage labour in the newly subsidized agricultural lands, etc.
Are you interested in knowing more about this study?, here the link: https://econpapers.repec.org/article/paldevelp/v_3a51_3ay_3a2008_3ai_3a1_... , for the full study see my thesis: The ethno-politics of water security. Contestation of ethnicity and gender in strategies to control water in the Andes of Peru. Doctoral Thesis, Wageningen University. The Netherlands. https://edepot.wur.nl/188580