Abstract            Volume:14  Issue-8  Year-2026         Original Research Articles

Online ISSN : 2347 - 3215 Issues : 12 per year Publisher : Excellent Publishers Email : editorijcret@gmail.com

In the Upper Comoé sub -basin in Burkina Faso, water is not only a natural resource but also the product of social, institutional, and political constructions that condition it access. The article uses the concept of hydro-social territory to show how the logics of the state, of Comoé Sugar Company, of rice farmers, and of informal operators overlap and come into tension, revealing conflicts of use and compromises aimed at maintaining a fragile balance. The study combines the use of a survey form with 384 households, institutional interviews, and field observations. The data have been statistically analyzed. The results highlight management marked by the industrial hegemony of SOSUCO, supported by the state, which dominates hydraulic infrastructures and generates a feeling of injustice from 85% of households. The average annual deficit of 8.3 million m³ increases competition between industrial, market gardening, domestic, and environmental uses. More tensions between upstream and downstream villages and land conflicts opposing customary law and state logic reinforce inequalities. The exclusion of certain actors, notably women and fishermen, fuels strategies of resistance and circumvention. Integrated Water Resources Management, through the Local Water Committee of the Cascades, plays an essential mediation role by promoting pragmatic compromises and’ institutional DIYs' that mix official rules and local arrangements, allowing communities to cope with the chronic insufficiency of the resource.

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