This document presents some of the concepts that will be discussed at 4th RBO Workshop on benefit sharing in the context of transboundary water resources management and development. Following international water law, transboundary watercourses are taken here to be surface water and/or groundwater bodies that are shared by more than one State. Benefit sharing in such systems was proposed initially by Sadoff and Grey (2002) as anrnalternative to the volumetric allocation of water, potentially offering greater scope for underpinning equitable agreements between riparians. Phillips and Woodhouse (in press) have suggested a definition of benefit sharing, as follows: "In the context of transboundary watercourses, benefit sharing may be defined as the process where riparians cooperate in optimising and equitably dividing the goods, products and services connectedrndirectly or indirectly to the watercourse, or arising from the use of its waters.