A Water User Board (WUB), or Water User Association (WUA) is a group of water users, such as irrigators, who pool their financial, technical, material, and human resources for the operation and maintenance of a water system. A WUA usually elects leaders, handles disputes internally, collects fees, and implements maintenance. In most areas, WUA membership depends on one's relationship to a water source (such as groundwater or a canal). Local Water User's Boards are widely used to manage irrigation in Peru, and are increasingly used to manage irrigation in the Dominican Republic, although with mixed results.

Characteristics of enduring, Self-governing WUAs

Political scientist Elinor Ostrom has identified seven important characteristics of organizations which manage common resources well: WUA are fundamentally a participatory, bottom-up concept. Though they have existed for centuries, they have received particular attention in recent decades as a development tool. WUAs have been organized in developing countries as diverse and distant as Thailand, Brazil, Turkey, Somalia, and Nepal among others.