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The eastern United States generally lacks statutory limits on the use of water for agricultural uses, particularly irrigation. Commentators lament this deficit and advocate for statutory limits, citing certain problematic cases, such as Georgia's former exemption for agricultural water use. No research surveys the status of agricultural water use in the eastern United States under so-called "regulated riparian" statutes. This article examines water use and the statutory water allocation rules in 19 eastern states with regulated riparian statutes to determine the extent of agricultural water uses in the East, as well as whether adequate controls are in place for such uses. This article analyzes water use data for each state and summarizes and categorizes the water allocation statutes in each state. The article concludes that the controls on agricultural water use in the East present a more nuanced issue than previously forecast, with agricultural uses of water posing issues in some states and not others, and with some states imposing comprehensive controls while others lack such a holistic approach. In almost all cases, state legislatures fail to link usage data with regulation. The article concludes with a recommendation to use effective existing regulations as model rules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adoption of a hybrid approach to water rights (the California doctrine) in some western states of the United States (U.S.) and Australia creates some doubt as to what factors drive water rights evolution. To date, commentators have argued climate is the only variable that affects this progression. However, climate alone cannot explain why the hybrid approach, persisted in nine of seventeen arid U.S. states and two Australian colonies. This paper shows that in addition to climate, the type of asset investment in water intensive sectors impacts water evolution via the mobility constraint. This study presents a predictive framework combining climate and asset type to determine the net effects on water scarcity and determine when and where riparian and/or appropriative water rights will evolve. In this article empirical evidence from several countries is used to verify the predictive capabilities of the framework. The findings indicated that the combination of variables included in the framework could better explain water rights evolution than climate alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]