The watershed approach allows a clear geographical and hydrological definition of an area to be managed. The management of water must – due to the nature of stream flow – ignore administrative
and political boundaries. Typical conflicts in a management area are upstream‐downstream user conflicts inclusive impacts on environment and social‐economic conditions. In rural areas most conflict are caused direct or indirect by water utilisation. The watershed approach is directly addressing upstream‐downstream water user conflicts and is consequently leading to problem solution. Next, management and modelling water resources can only be conducted professional, when a hydrological watershed is defined:

• The size of the catchment is known
• Water demand can be derived 
• Water availability can be computed 
• Management area can be split into pieces due to geomorphologic conditions.