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Abstract
Although there has been a policy thrust towards making all Australians more cognisant
of the relative scarcity of water resources, the approach adopted for urban dwellers
differs markedly from that applied to irrigators. These differences are examined from
a property-rights perspective focussing primarily on the institutional hierarchies in the
Victorian water sector. The analysis reveals significant attenuation of urban dwellers’
rights, presumably on the basis of the information deficiencies that circumscribe urban
water use. Alternative policy options are then proposed, which might alleviate some
of these information deficiencies and simultaneously address the efficiency losses that
attend the present arrangements.