Message from the Chair
The Future of Large Dams

WCD Chair Kader Asmal signs the Final Report

While any Commission is tempted by the notion that its report offers a conclusive result, we have always been conscious of the fact that our mandate was different.

We have offered no verdict but an under-standing and analysis of "what is broken and needs to be fixed." We do not prescribe an out-come but propose a framework for effective and transparent decision-making. We do not prejudge whether a dam should be built but offer criteria and guidelines to enable societies to identify preferred options. We do not pre-scribe development models but do provide a set of core values and ethical principles which we believe no development project can ignore.

Do we raise the bar? Yes, and so we should! Our global review offers substantive and substantiated evidence for why this should be the case.

On all three counts - economic efficiency, social equity and environmental sustainability - dams have too often fallen short of what is desirable and acceptable. Not all dams - but a sufficiently high number to make a strong and convincing case for change - not only at the margins but at the core of how our societies take development decisions. Our report is thus not only about dams but about development, and the process by which we make development choices.

Some may be tempted to blame the report for making dam construction more difficult. But this would be erroneous, akin to blaming the messenger. For more than a decade, dam construction has been in decline. Multilateral and bilateral financiers have been withdrawing. Each year, fewer and fewer new dams are funded. Private investors and developers remain reluctant to accept the high risks associated with dams.

Others may use the report as a means of opposing any and all dams by calling for blanket moratoria, and thus paralysis. This, too would be a mistake. We unequivocally affirm that in response to growing development needs dams remain one important option. To turn that option into an ideological crusade - by either side and for whatever reason - would not only be doomed to failure but ultimately disenfranchising: It preempts whole societies from mak-ing an informed choice which is their sovereign and human right.

Our report offers a new approach to decision making. If developers - public or private - can respond to this challenge, dams will continue to be built. However, if societies cannot be convinced that a dam is their best and preferred option then opposition will continue to grow - not because of the WCD report but in spite of it.

Professor Kader Asmal
Chair of the WCD