I joined the School of International Development at UEA in May 1994 as a lecturer in Natural Resources.  Prior to that I worked for two major organisations - the Commonwealth Development Corporation (where I was based in Swaziland on the IYSIS project) and then Hunting Technical Services Ltd (now HTSPE).  From 1994 to 2001 I both taught on UG and PG courses and undertook my doctoral research.

My doctoral research considered design-management interactions on large-scale canal irrigation systems, with a focus on Southern Africa. This work attempted to characterise and model the factors that influence the performance of irrigation schemes with a view to providing guidance on system evaluation and best practices for rehabilitation.

During 2001 to 2006 I was as Team Leader for a DFID-KAR project in Tanzania called RIPARWIN - Raising Irrigation Productivity and Releasing Water for Intersectoral Needs. See this website for more details. 

During the period 2006 to 2010, I became Head of School, DEV at the University.  

I am also a Fellow of Institute of Civil Engineers (FICE) and work with the UK section of the International Commission on Irrigation and Drainage (ICID) as its Chair from 2011 to 2014.

I acquired my PhD (reading Irrigation Design & Management) from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne in 1998. Prior to that I gained my Masters of Science in Irrigation (Distinction) also from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne in 1992. My BSc in Soil Science (Hons) is from University of Reading, graduating in 1985.

 

CV and Experience

Download Bruce's short CV here
Download Bruce's full CV here 

My main research areas are: water resources planning and management; river basin management; irrigation systems analysis; community-based irrigation; design management interactions; conflict resolution and natural resource gaming.

Key country experience includes Tanzania, South Africa, Pakistan, India, Nigeria, Swaziland.

Research Groups: UEA Water Security Research Centre
 

Research Activities

My research is broadly categorised into:

1. Dynamic systems and behaviours related to irrigation and river basins in developing countries via a non-equilibrium ecological lens (for example the 2007 paper in Global Environmental Change). 
2. Irrigation efficiency and productivity studies. Irrigation efficiency and productivity measurement and theorising (author of responses to the debate on basin-wide measures of irrigation productivity, plus the recent paper on the liminal commons).
3. Water and river basin governance. Institutional analysis of irrigation systems, water allocation, user participation and river basin/water management, particularly critiquing the design of IWRM applied to river basins in Sub-Saharan Africa (c.f. the 2010 paper 'The Cathedral and Bazaar' paper).
4. Natural resource gaming (the river basin game). The role of multi-agent games and deliberative tools in the management and allocation of water (author and designer of the river basin game and facilitator of workshops/multi-agent spreadsheets for water allocation). 
5. User-centred design of irrigation systems to raise performance as well as to reflect on theories of irrigation engineering and engineers-in-irrigation (my doctoral research). 
6. Irrigation policy for Sub-Saharan livelihoods and agricultural growth. Policy analysis of interventions to expand and rehabilitate irrigation in Sub-Saharan Africa (author of the Commission for Africa section on irrigation infrastructure; recent author of opinion piece in journal Water Alternatives).
7. Irrigation livelihoods studies including both LADDER work and consultancy in Kyrgyzstan on water user associations.
8. Application of demand management to environmental and ecological water resources to sustain or increase productivity in that sector
9. ESPA project (Pongola river). Science of water and ecosystems services within irrigated river basins (evidenced by the recently funded NERC ‘ESPA’ project in South Africa) to examine trade-offs and interfaces between wetlands and irrigated agriculture.
10. Analysis of the impacts of transboundary water law, in particular the principle of equitable allocation defined in the UN Watercourses convention, on water allocation.

Research Supervision

I am currently supervising the following research students:

• Citalli Becerril-Tinoco; 'Institutional Analysis of Water Management in Mexico'
• David Blake; 'Irrigationalism – the politics and ideology of irrigation development in the Nam Songkhram Basin, Northeast Thailand'
• María de Jesús Márquez Dorantes; 'The institutional paradox of water investment in Mexico City: Institutional arrangements for trade-offs in actors’ objectives and their constraints to the sustainable development of the water sector.'
• Matthew England; 'IWRM and Climate Change in India'
• Virginia Hooper: 'Inter-sectoral water allocation in developing countries'

 

Publications

2011 and forthcoming
Lankford, B.A. Forthcoming. The liminal commons: prefigurations and transitions in resource efficiency. Submitted to Global Environmental Change

Lankford B.A.  Forthcoming. Fictions, fractions, factorials, fractures and fractals; on the framing of irrigation efficiency. Accepted for publication by the Journal of Agricultural Water Management

Bunclark, L and Lankford B.A. 2011. Rainwater harvesting: A suitable poverty reduction strategy for small-scale farmers in developing countries?  Accepted for publication by the Waterlines Journal

Lankford, B., Pringle, C.,  Dickens, C., Lewis, F., Mander, M., Chhotray, V.,  Goulden, M., Nxele, Z., and Quayle, L. 2011. Hydrological modelling of water allocation, ecosystem services and poverty alleviation in the Pongola Floodplain, South Africa. Journal of Environmental Planning and Management.


2010
Lankford, B.A., 2010. Responding to water scarcity – beyond the volumetric. In, Mehta, L. (ed) The Limits of Scarcity.  Earthscan, London.

Lankford, B.A. 2010. Improving irrigated agricultural productivity in an age of food and water scarcity. In J. Osikena and D. Tickner (eds) Tackling the Worldwater Crisis: Reshaping the Future of Foreign Policy. Foreign Policy Centre, London, pp 35-40.

Lankford, B.A. and Hepworth, N. 2010. The Cathedral and the Bazaar: Monocentric and polycentric river basin management.  Water Alternatives 3(1): 82-101.  
Link to journal  (open access once registered)

Pittock, J. and Lankford, B.A. 2010. Environmental water requirements: demand management in an era of water scarcity. Journal of Integrative Environmental Sciences, 7(1):1–19

2009 
Lankford, B.A.  2009. The right irrigation? Policy directions for agricultural water management in sub-Saharan Africa. Water Alternatives 2(3): 476-480. 
Link to journal  (open access once registered)

Lankford, B.A., Tumbo, S. and Rajabu, K. 2009. Water competition, variability and river basin governance: A critical analysis of the Great Ruaha River, Tanzania. In; F. Molle and P. Wester (Editors) River Basin Development in Perspective, CABI.  Pp 171-195.

Mehari, A., Barbara Van Koppen, B., McCartney, M. and  Lankford. BA. 2009.  Unchartered innovation? Local reforms of national formal water management in the Mkoji sub-catchment, Tanzania.  Physics and Chemistry of the Earth, Parts A/B/C. 34, (4-5): 299-308

2008
Magombeyi, M.S., Rollin, D., Lankford, B.A. 2008. The river basin game as a tool for collective water management at community level in South Africa. Physics and Chemistry of the Earth, Parts A/B/C (33): 873-880

McCartney, M., Kashaigili, J.J., Lankford, B.A., Mahoo, H. F., 2008. Hydrological modelling to assist water management in the Usangu wetlands, Tanzania.  Intl. J. River Basin Management,  6(1) pp. 51–61
Link to document

2007
Mahoo, H. F.; Mkoga, Z. J.; Kasele, S. S.; Igbadun, H. E.; Hatibu, N.; Rao, K. P. C.; Lankford, B. 2007. Productivity of water in agriculture: Farmers’ perceptions and practices. Colombo, Sri Lanka: International Water Management Institute. 37p (Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture Discussion Paper 5)

Lankford, B.A., 2007. Integrated, adaptive and domanial water resources management. International Conference on Adaptive and Integrated Water Resources Management. CAIWA 12 – 15 November 2007. Basel, Switzerland.

Lankford, B. A. and Dickinson, S. 2007.  Water management issues and problems in Africa, CAB Reviews: Perspectives in Agriculture, Veterinary Science, Nutrition and Natural Resources 2007 2, No. 032

McCartney, M. P., Lankford, B. A. and Mahoo, H. F. 2007. Agricultural water management in a water stressed catchment: Lessons from the RIPARWIN project. Research Report 116.  International Water Management Institute. Columbo, Sri Lanka. 

Lankford, B. A and Mwaruvanda, W.  2007. A legal-infrastructural framework for catchment apportionment. In ‘Community-based Water Law and Water Resource Management Reform in Developing Countries’. Barbara Van Koppen, Mark Giordano, and John Butterworth(eds).  Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture Series, CABI Publishing.  228-247

Lankford, B.A. Merrey, D., Cour, J., and Hepworth, N. 2007. From Integrated to Expedient: An Adaptive Framework for River Basin Management in Developing Countries. Research Report 110.  International Water Management Institute. Columbo, Sri Lanka. 

Lankford, B. A. and Watson, D. 2007. Metaphor in natural resource gaming; insights from the River Basin Game. Simulation & Gaming Vol. 38 (3) 421-442
Link to document

Lankford B. A. and Beale, T. 2007. Equilibrium and non-equilibrium theories of sustainable water resources management: dynamic river basin and irrigation behaviour in Tanzania. Global Environmental Change 17: 168–180 
Link to document 

2006
Kashaigili, J. J.; McCartney, M. P.; Mahoo, H. F.; Lankford, B. A.; Mbilinyi, B. P.; Yawson, D. K.; and Tumbo, S. D. 2006. Use of a hydrological model for environmental management of the Usangu wetlands, Tanzania. IWMI Research Report 104. Colombo, Sri Lanka: International Water Management Institute. 48p

Lankford, B.A. 2006. Localising irrigation efficiency. Irrigation and Drainage Systems 55: 345–362

van Koppen, B. Sokile, C., Lankford, B.A., Mahoo, H., Hatibu, N., and Yanda P, 2007.  Water rights and water fees in Tanzania. In; Irrigation Water Pricing: The Gap Between Theory and Practice edited by Francois Molle, and Jeremy Berkoff.  Pp 143-164. Sponsored by the Comprehensive Assessment.  IWMI/CABI. Wallingford  

2005
Lankford, BA (2005) Rural infrastructure to contribute to African agricultural development: the case of irrigation. Report for The Commission for Africa, School of Development Studies, University of East Anglia, Norwich. 

Lankford. BA. 2005.  Facilitation of Water Sharing Arrangements in the Hadejia Jama’are Komadugu Yobe Basin (HJKYB) - with the River Basin Game Dialogue Tool. Final report. For DFID: Joint Wetlands Livelihoods Project. Dutse, Nigeria.. 65 pp.
Link to journal article

Kashaigili,J.J., Kadigi, R.M.J,  Lankford, B.A, Mahoo, H.F. and Mashauri, D.A. 2005. Environmental flows allocation in river basins: Exploring allocation challenges and options in the Great Ruaha River catchment in Tanzania. Journal of Physics and Chemistry of the Earth, 30(11-16): 689-697

Mkoga, Z, J., Hatibu, N., Mahoo, H., Lankford, B.A. and  Rao. K. P.C. 2005. Disparity of Attitudes and Practices on a Concept of Productivity of Water In Agriculture in the Great Ruaha River Sub-Basin. In the Proceedings of the “East Africa River Basin Management Conference” Morogoro 7-9 March 2005, Morogoro, Tanzania

Kadigi, R. M. J.; Mdoe, N. S.; Lankford, B. A.; Morardet, Sylvie. 2005. The value of water for irrigated rice and hydropower generation in the Great Ruaha, Tanzania. In East Africa “Integrated River Basin Management” Conference held at ICE Hall, Sokoine University of Agriculture Morogoro, Tanzania, 7-9 March 2005, 13 p.

Kashaigili, J.J., Mahoo, H. F., McCartney, M., Lankford, B.A., Mbilinyi, B.P. & Mwanuzi, F.L. 2005. Integrated hydrological modelling of wetlands for environmental management: The case of the Usangu wetlands in the Great Ruaha Catchment. Proceedings of  the East Africa River Basin Management Conference, 7th – 9th March 2005,  Sokoine University of Agriculture, Morogoro, Tanzania. 87-99. 

Palmer-Jones, R. and Lankford, B. A. 2005. Agricultural Development: Reflections on the study of the irrigation potential of the Usangu Plains of Tanzania.  In: Development Economics and Social Justice.  Essays in Honour of Ian Livingstone.  (Eds M. Tribe, J. Thoburn, R. Palmer-Jones). 141-158.  Ashgate. Aldershot. 

2004
Lankford, B., Sokile, C., Yawson, D., Lévite, L and Sally, H. 2004. The River Basin Game: A role-playing board game for initiating discussions on visions and strategies of water allocation.  Paper presented at the ‘Water Resource Management For Local Development Workshop’: Aventura, Loskopdam. South Africa, 8 – 11 November 2004.

van Koppen, B. Sokile, Hatibu, N., C., Lankford, B.A., Mahoo, H., and Yanda P, 2004. Formal Water Rights in Tanzania: Deepening the Dichotomy? Working Paper 71.  Columbo, Sri Lanka; International Water Management Institute 

Lankford, B., Sokile, C., Yawson, D. and Lévite, L. 2004. The River Basin Game:  A Water Dialogue Tool.  Working Paper 75.  Columbo, Sri Lanka; International Water Management Institute

Lankford, B.A.  2004.  Irrigation, Livelihoods and River Basins.  In Rural Livelihoods and Poverty Reduction Policies (eds. F. Ellis, and H. A. Freeman) Routledge, London.
 
Lankford, B. A., van Koppen, B, Franks, T and Mahoo, H. 2004. Entrenched views or insufficient science? Contested causes and solutions of water allocation; insights from the Great Ruaha River Basin, Tanzania.  Agricultural Water Management 69:2 135-153

Lankford, B. A. (2004) Resource-centred thinking in river basins: should we revoke the crop water approach to irrigation planning? Agricultural Water Management 68:1 33-46
Link to document 

Lankford, B. A. 2004. Irrigation improvement projects in Tanzania; scale impacts and policy implications. Water Policy 6 (2) 89-102.

Franks, T., Lankford, B. and Mdemu M. 2004. Managing Water Amongst Competing Uses: The Usangu Wetland in Tanzania. Irrigation and Drainage (53): 1-10

Mdemu M. V., Magayane M. D., Lankford B., Hatibu N. and Kadigi R. M. J. 2004. Conjoining Rainfall and Irrigation Seasonality to Enhance Productivity of Water in Large Rice Irrigated Farms in the Upper Ruaha River Basin, Tanzania. Physics and Chemistry of the Earth. 29(15-18) pp 1119-1124

2003
Machibya, M., Lankford, B. and Mahoo, H., 2003.  Real or imagined water competition? The case of rice irrigation in the Usangu basin and Mtera/Kidatu hydropower, In Tanzania Hydro-Africa Conference, Arusha, Tanzania AICC, 17-19 November 2003. Also due for presentation at the Ruaha + 10 Seminar.  ICE Conference Hall, Morogoro, 11-12th December 2003. 

Lankford, B.A. and Sokile, C. 2003. Reflections on the river basin game: Role-playing facilitation of surface water allocation in contested environments. ICID 20th European Regional Conference Water and Conflict, Montpellier, France, 17-19 September 2003. 

Lankford, B. A. 2003. Irrigation-based livelihood trends in river basins: theory and policy implications for irrigation development. Physics and Chemistry of the Earth (28): 817-825

Lankford, B. A. 2003. Environmental water requirements: A demand management perspective. CIWEM. Journal of the Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management 17(1): 19-22 
 
2002
Lankford, B.A.  2002. Irrigation, Livelihoods and River Basins. LADDER working paper No. 14.  University of East Anglia, UK. 

Lankford, B.A.  2002. Irrigated livelihood trends in river basins – implications for policy. In proceedings of ‘3rd WATERNET/WARFSA Symposium: Water Demand Management for Sustainable Development 30-31 October 2002’  Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

Franks, T, and Lankford, B. 2002. Managing Water in the Usangu Basin, Tanzania.  Paper Accepted for question 51.1 Montreal ICID Congress, Montreal, Canada, 2002

2001/2000
Lankford, B. A. 2001, Red Routes On Blue Rivers: Strategic Water Management for the Ruaha River Basin, Tanzania. Water Resources Development, 17(3): 427-444

Lankford, B. A., Franks, T., 2000, The Sustainable Co-Existence Of Wetlands And Rice Irrigation - A Case Study From Tanzania. The Environment and Development Journal, 9(2), 119-137

Baur, P. Mandeville, N. Lankford, B and Boake, R. 2000, Upstream/downstream competition for water in the Usangu Basin, Tanzania.  In, Proceedings of the British Hydrological Symposium, Seventh National Hydrology Symposium, University of Newcastle 6-8, September 2000.  BHS National Hydrology Symposium Series.

Earlier publications

 Lankford, B. A. and Gowing, J. W. 1998. Participatory research of water control on surface irrigation systems: informing perceptions, in Water and the Environment: Innovative issues in irrigation and drainage, (eds. L. S. Pereira and J.W. Gowing), E & FN Spon, London, pp. 223-230.

Lankford, B. A. 1998. Effective monitoring of canal irrigation with minimum or no flow measurement, in Water and the Environment: Innovative issues in irrigation and drainage, (eds. L. S. Pereira and J.W. Gowing), E & FN Spon, London, 265-273.

Lankford, B. A. and Gowing, J.  1997. Providing a water delivery service through design management interactions and system management, in Water: Economics, Management and Demand, (eds M. Kay, Franks, T. and Smith, L.) E & FN Spon, London, pp 238-246.

Lankford, B.A. and Gowing, J.  1996. Understanding water supply control in canal irrigation systems, in Water Policy: Allocation and Management in Practice, (eds P. Howsan and R. Carter), E & FN Spon, London, pp 186-193

Lankford, B. A. and Gowing, J. 1996. The impact of design approximations on the operational performance of an irrigation scheme: a case study in Malaysia. Irrigation and Drainage Systems Vol. 10: 193-205  (Kluwer Academic Publishers)

Lankford, B. A. 1992. The use of measured water flows in furrow irrigation management - a case study in Swaziland. Irrigation and Drainage Systems, 6: 113-128
Link to document   

Ellis, R. D., and Lankford, B. A. (1988). The tolerance of sugarcane to water stress during its main development phases. Agric Water Manage., 17: 117-128

Vounaki, T and Lankford, B.A.  2009.  Feasibility of a legal-infrastructural framework; insights for the dry season from the Mkoji- Sub Catchment, Tanzania.  (A 2006 Fieldwork Report for the RIPARWIN  project, reproduced as a working paper for the School of International Development).

Because of research and administration commitments, I have scaled down my teaching activities in DEV.  When teaching I enjoy using innovative methods, including group work in brainstorming, prioritising and presenting analyses; field trips for teaching statistics; use of PowerPoint, Web HTML, and Excel models in teaching and seminar sessions; peer-assessed student presentations; peer-assessed essays; and games and role-playing.  I’ve taught on 14 different PG and UG courses, convening nine of them, including Resource Management (Water); Resource Development & Conservation; Rural Development; Natural Resources for undergraduates; The NR Field Trip, locating 3 new sites of study in Scotland; Natural Resources 2 (Soils); Data in Development Studies and Quantitative Analysis of Natural Resources Management.

Research Supervision

I am currently supervising the following research students:

Citalli Becerril-Tinoco; 'Institutional Analysis of Water Management in Mexico'

David Blake; 'Irrigationalism – the politics and ideology of irrigation development in the Nam Songkhram Basin, Northeast Thailand'

María de Jesús Márquez Dorantes; 'The institutional paradox of water investment in Mexico City: Institutional arrangements for trade-offs in actors’ objectives and their constraints to the sustainable development of the water sector.'

Matthew England; 'IWRM and Climate Change in India'

Virginia Hooper: 'Inter-sectoral water allocation in developing countries'

 

Recent and past students have included

Dorice Agol; ‘Linking Culture and Science: Water Resources in Kenya’

Henry Alhassan; ‘Large Dams: A Development Imperative, a Tyranny of Technology, or a Subversion of Southern Coutries Development: Case Studies of the Akosombo Dam and the Bui Dam Project of Ghana’

Nicholas Hepworth; ‘The Role of Regulatory Practice in Integrated Water Resource Management: Impacts, Implications and Insights for Progress via a Multiple Case Study of Sectoral Water Uses in Tanzania’

Joe Hill; ‘Water Rights and Water Governance in Chotanagpur, Jharkhand’

Suzanty Sitorus; ‘Linkages between Water, Politics and Territoriality in the Implementation of Integrated Water Resources Management: The Case in Indonesia'

Julien Cour; ‘Understanding the Needs of Institutions for the Development of Water Resource Management 'Decision Aids' Software: Learning from the Ruaha Basin, Tanzania’