[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]
dam-l LS: MRC Agricultural and Irrigation Programme
From: jleake@iid.org
About: MRC Agricultural and Irrigation Programme
Below is a draft concept for a strategic framework for the formation
an Agricultural and Irrigation Programme for the MRC, This is intended
to elicit comment from interested parties prior to finalisation.
The opinions are those of the author and do not constitute the views
of the MRC. Upon acceptance of this conceptual framework the MRC will
invite countries to propose projects that will serve to meet their
development objectives and those of the MRC on their behalf.
John Leake
Consultant to MRC
A Draft Conceptual Framework for the formulation of an Agriculture and
Irrigation Programme (AIP) for the Mekong River Commission (MRC)
Background
The Mekong River Commission was established out of a desire on the
part of it's members to cooperate in mutually beneficial sustainable
development and utilization of the basins abundant resources related
to water. This mandate of MRC's is specified in the 1995 agreement
under which the commission was established to succeed the previous
Committee set up in 1957. The present strategic plan of the Commission
to meet this mandate, features 6 goals and 4 key result areas (KRAs),
most related to regulation and conservation. This objective to
conserve and regulate the water resources of the basin is directly in
line with articles 5 and 26 of the 1995 agreement and is receiving
support from the World Bank through activities to develop water
utilization rules under the Water Utilization Programme (WUP). This
WUP programme features in the MRC strategic plan as goal number one
out of five to be achieved by 2003.
Member country interest in exploitation is expressed in article 2 of
the 1995 agreement and is receiving MRC focus through the
establishment of a process to result in a rolling Basin Development
Plan (BDP). The planning and promotion of sustainable agricultural and
related uses of water is covered under Articles 1 and 2 of the 1995
agreement. This BDP programme features in the MRC strategic plan as
goal number 2 to be achieved by 2003. The visions and mission of the
MRC as expressed in the MRC strategic plan all include the words
'socially just' and 'social well being' thus giving expression to a
common objective of potential donors and financiers concerning poverty
alleviation and equity in development.
Agriculture and Irrigation Programme
The Agriculture and Irrigation Programme (AIP) is intended to cover
those activities necessary to meet MRC's mandate for sustainable
development of agriculture related water use. The AIP has evolved
progressively in response to the changing mandate of MRC and it's
predecessor organisations and the changing interpretation of this
mandate. The emphasis of the 1960's and 1970's was towards the
development of large infrastructure projects to make use of the
region's significant resources. By the late 1980's the mandate had
evolved towards enabling donors to provide assistance in the general
area of irrigation related agriculture in circumstances that inhibited
the provision of assistance on a bilateral basis in many cases. MRC's
agricultural related experience during this period focused around
efficient and sustainable ways of utilising irrigation water including
the formation and operation of Water User Groups (WUGs) and other
institutional support to member countries and was an area where
significant success was achieved according to evaluation reports.
The AIP as now formulated utilised this experience and a 1996 study
entitled Integrated Land and Water Use for Sustainable Agricultural
Development in the Lower Mekong Basin (funded by Denmark) to prepare a
1st draft AIP. This was circulated to member countries and potential
donors following which 2nd and 3rd drafts were completed. The 3rd
draft was considered and endorsed by an Expert Consultation workshop
that included a wide range of stakeholders and experts in October 1998
in Bangkok. A final draft was submitted to a joint MRC Joint Committee
and Council meeting in October 1998 and approved as a high priority
programme for MRC involvement.
The strategic thrust of AIP as now formulated is to institutionalise
the successful developments of past in each member nation, to assist
farmers to improve established irrigation schemes and to provide
associated institutional capacity building and policy guidelines to
member countries. As discussed above, this approach has been endorsed
by a wide range of stakeholders on technical and social grounds, but
the AIP has not yet gained much financial support and some question
whether MRC is the appropriate agency to implement these
activities. There may be two reasons for this; the necessity of
regional cooperation for many of these activities in the present
political and market environment may not have been specified
sufficiently, and the strategic importance of AIP to MRC's mandate has
not been given expression by linking AIP to its mainstream programmes,
the WUP and BDP.
Accordingly MRC has commissioned this study and associated discussion
with member countries and potential donors to re-examine the AIP with
a view to adapting it to current circumstances and ensuring it forms
part of a coherent strategy that will meet MRC's mandate. Then to
assist member countries to prepare specific activities they request
for funding under MRC.
The Strategic Importance of Basin Agriculture to the Region and the
World
The Mekong basin has long been one of the world's great food sources
and it has the potential to lift and sustain much higher production in
the future with careful management as future demand expresses its self
in higher prices. Some 80 percent of the Basin's population of 60
million people are engaged in agriculture and the lives of perhaps 300
million people in South East Asia, South West China and else where
depends on its production. (The exact figures for export not easily
estimated for the basin as a whole, as much rice exported Thailand
comes from outside the basin and much rice produced in the delta in
Vietnam is consumed in Vietnam but outside of the basin).
The potential for development exists because most of it's agricultural
land now produces only one crop per year although three are possible
with irrigation and, in aggregate, only a very small percentage of the
water of the basin is used for irrigation. However care is needed
with expansion as some of this irrigation occurs when the river is low
and much more of its water is used passively in the rain fed
agriculture, forests and fisheries that supports the regions people
and otherwise supports it's rich natural biological resources.
Although plans to develop dams to exploit the basin's water more
deliberately for power and agriculture have existed for a long time
circumstances have prevented their development. It is now increasingly
recognised that planning and implementation of such development must
pay more attention to the sustainability of the systems that support
these fisheries and forests and its biological diversity if its role
as one of the worlds great food sources is to remain for future
generations. It also must consider the livelihood and involvement of
the regions inhabitants in these activities if the present relative
levels of poverty are to be relieved. The 1995 agreement indicates
that a primary reason for the establishment of MRC is to develop a
capacity to undertake this planning for a sustainable use of the
basins resources in a mutually satisfactory way.
The Strategic Importance of Agriculture to MRC
AIP is strategically important to MRC and its member countries because
reliable knowledge about agricultural related use of water is
essential to meet MRC's mandate to develop water utilisation rules and
to develop a useful basin planning process. In specific terms the
efficiency of use of water and associated inputs in both rain fed
agriculture and irrigation has actual and potential basin wide impacts
in two different but complementary directions, both requiring regional
cooperation for desirable results; Shared knowledge of water use and
the potential to improve the efficiency of utilisation (and drainage)
will be necessary as nations begin to apportion water at critical
periods. As water use increases, regional cooperation will be
necessary to apportion water in certain catchments that cross
borders. Regional cooperation in navigation rights for the 'free'
transport of inputs and production will be necessary to establish
cross border production/ trade chains for many crops that use water
more efficiently. It is highly desirable to improve technology and
information exchange between member countries to improve economic
development in each country, regional cooperation is necessary to
minimise cross border economic and environmental impacts from poorly
designed or implemented irrigation schemes and destructive land use in
upland water catchment areas. This requires a catchment management
perspective to basin planning in agriculture and AIP involvement is
important to assist both the BDP process in this way and to share this
perspective in a common way across line agencies in each MRC country
Conceptually WUP addresses some of these issues concerning the
efficient use of irrigation water by seeking to develop water
utilisation rules based on an understanding of the mass balance of
water source and water use. BDP addresses other concerns by seeking to
harmonise development of these resources in the long-term interests of
its member nations. AIP is necessary to address the gaps in these
programmes in the areas of; investigations and activities to
understand present water (and associated input) use and to improve
water (and associated input) use efficiency in agriculture in the
future development and extension of sustainable catchment management
processes for agriculture in and for the basin, and data collection
and sharing to; develop a feeling of 'ownership' of the data by each
of the member states (shared knowledge), to improve the quality of the
data over time and, to facilitate MRC's role as a 'learning
institution' about river management for member countries
A review of the WUP implementation plan (December 1999) indicates that
data collection exists and can be further developed for most water
sources; for rainfall, for water movement between the river and the
great lake and for water exit from the basin at the delta. Data
collection for present and future water use is much less developed in
WUP, this is illustrated in Figure 1.0. Data of varying quality and
quantity already exists in each member nation but are not easily
accessible, not often in a common languages or units and not easily
referenced to particular land units. This deficiency is to be
addressed under WUP through a data gap study and by using such figures
as will be institutionally acceptable to member countries until better
data can be obtained. However, while this approach is logical and
appropriate, the conceptual framework of WUP is regulation and
conservation and it is not clear that this approach will necessarily
gain the clearest picture of water use and the potential for
improvement. This data cannot result in the most appropriate
utilisation rules or basin planning if pursued in isolation.
The missing element is the agricultural economic and social
imperatives driving present and future use of MRB water resources,
both in upland catchment and agricultural areas. The way in which AIP
contributes to these main strategic directions of MRC is depicted in
Figure 2.0.
Objective of the Agriculture and Irrigation Programme
The overall objective of the AIP may be stated as; to enhance regional
cooperation to facilitate sustainable agricultural development based
on water, particularly through optimising water use in irrigation,
rain fed and upland catchment areas of the basin. The achievement of
this objective has both long term and medium term aspects. In the long
term AIP has to contribute to the development of MRC as a 'learning
institution', a centre of excellence in the area of agricultural
planning and water use efficiency. In the medium term it needs to
undertake activities that will satisfy immediate goals of MRC member
nations and the MRC. To progressively contribute to each of the Key
Result Areas of the MRC strategic plan as set out as immediate goals
in the MRC 2000 work programme: to assist in the establishment of
realistic rules for water utilisation (goal 1), to assist in the
establishment of an effective and useful basin planning process (goal
2), to be instrumental in integrating socio-economic considerations
into MRC activities (part of goal 3), to have a role in ongoing and
new programmes and projects (goal 4) and to contribute to capacity
building within MRC in the areas of agricultural planning (goal 5).
The objective would be addressed through three linked themes, which
would be pursued in different ways and often combined in many
projects:
Optimising water use for agricultural production. To modernise or
improve some irrigation schemes and upland catchment areas through
national institutions identified above where these are representative
of significant MRC geo units: to assist in the optimisation and
institutionalisation of appropriate sustainable irrigation practices
in each MRC member nation making use of experience gained in the
previous MRC Sustainable Irrigated Agriculture Project (SIRAP), in
participatory processes and management of water through water user
groups to under take investigations, under farmer participatory action
research (PAR) conditions, into a range of agricultural crops with
particular reference to water use and associated inputs and outputs
including effluent and other pollutants and to provide data from these
activities to concerned units of MRC and member countries, this may be
undertaken in cooperation with bilaterally funded projects or
programmes directed at improving irrigation or agriculture generally
to investigate different irrigation systems, pumps and agricultural
technologies, being marketed in the region and to publish the results
in basin languages and in different media including the WEB to
investigate, in collaboration with the MRC forestry and fishery
divisions, agricultural and livestock production activities where
these are complementary and particularly where these will serve to
reduce degradation in upland catchment areas. This will include inter
alia; participation by ethnic people where relevant, the use of
legumes, agro forestry and sloping agricultural land technologies
(SALT) and the publishing of results in basin and relevant ethnic
languages and in different media according to audience, including the
WEB. To undertake investigations into agricultural solutions to
significant agronomic problems such as rising saline ground waters and
acid sulfate soils on a PAR basis
To contribute a catchment management perspective to the BDP planning
process To facilitate the use of data, farmers and officials involved
in the above activities to be involved in the development of the BDP
and other planning processes including that supported by other donors,
the private sector and NGO's to contribute to the institutionalisation
of sustainable catchment basin management practices in agricultural
planning in basin countries to participate in workshops and other
planning or evaluation activities to aid the BDP process in the long
term to facilitate study tours by communities and officials from other
member nations to the PAR stations supported by AIP to facilitate the
involvement of relevant ethnic people in the planning process in their
own areas where these are critical to basin ecological integrity to
foster links with appropriate institutions in the observer nations of
Myanmar and China to facilitate their involvement in BDP to
participate in private sector development projects on a cost recovery
basis to aid their planning for activities that will meet the
objectives of harmonious development of basin agricultural and
livestock resources, particularly where these foster cross border
production/ trade networks.
Data acquisition and dissemination. The programme would identify and
forge a relationship with appropriate institutions in each MRC member
country that would continue as MRC data sources in the long term; to
gather data on water use by crop and MRC geo unit to suit WUP and
other MRC and member country purposes as mutually agreed to set up
field experiments and controls (including by rehabilitating
appropriate irrigation schemes see below) to enable data gaps to be
filled and to investigate water use in a range of crops of interest to
member countries to gather data on other crop inputs and production
and effluent outputs including economic and social data to facilitate
modelling of agricultural and livestock practices by MRC geo unit,
this will include data on ethnic minority land and water use in
relevant areas to facilitate calculations of crop water use by remote
sensing or other means by undertaking ground truthing activities on
these stations and controls in collaboration with other appropriate
units of MRC to translate the information into English and other basin
and relevant ethnic languages and to digitise this and make it
available by WEB and other agreed means to maximise its use by member
countries.
The strategic approach of AIP would be to facilitate national line
agencies or appropriate national research agencies to undertake
activities on behalf of MRC for the ultimate benefit of communities in
the basin. This is to ensure ownership of the activities and so
enhance the institutional learning aspects of MRC's mandate.
The Agriculture and Irrigation Programme
As discussed above the AIP needs to satisfy its short to medium
objectives in such a way as to contribute to the achievement of its
long-term goals. The proceedings of the Expert Consultation in Bangkok
in 1998, which endorsed the AIP, indicates that each member nation of
MRC has national priorities for development within each country but
many of these have only incidental relevance to MRC's mandate. This is
particularly so in the area of establishing a need for regional
cooperation in order that the activities be successful. To attract
support for AIP it is necessary to establish the relevance of AIP to
MRC's mandate for regional cooperation. However it is also clear that
if MRC is to achieve its long-term goals on behalf of member nations
it must also satisfy some immediate national goals in each country to
achieve eventual 'ownership' of MRC's longer-term goals.
To achieve 'ownership' of MRC activities on the part of member (and
where possible observer nations) it is necessary that activities be
requested by member nations and be seen as a national priority able to
obtain recurrent funding under the national budget where relevant.
The AIP thus can be seen as a rolling programme in which projects
requested by member countries, including the projects that have
already been requested, are selected for action based on their
relevance to national priorities and MRC's mandate. It is also
necessary to assess whether the activity has some basin wide
implication that would be better addressed by MRC. This relationship
between the achievement of MRC's long term goals through the
implementation of activities that might be requested by member nations
with more immediate and more nationally oriented goals is depicted in
Figure 3.0.
The focus of AIP is to undertake activities of interest to its member
nations to enable MRC to meet its mandate with regard to the efficient
and sustainable use of water related resources connected with
agriculture.
The criteria for selection of activities to be undertaken include
three tests, all of which must be satisfied before the activity is
taken in by MRC. The activity must have; some significant basin wide
implication that is not being adequately covered under other
programmes in the basin national priority, that is at least one nation
and an appropriate institution (public or private) must want the
activity to be undertaken for a national purpose significant relevance
to the MRC mandate, the degree of relevance would also provide
guidance as to the degree of MRC involvement, where the relevance was
out of proportion to the cost, MRC involvement might extend only to
providing some input to an activity essentially undertaken by others,
where the activity was highly relevant but unlikely to be taken up by
others at all MRC would consider execution of the activity though a
national institution on a contractual basis
Programme implementation needs to allow for a range of modalities and
funding mechanisms depending on the requirements of individual
activities but the key requirement is that this facilitates MRC's
evolution as a learning institution, a centre of excellence 'owned' by
its member nations. As discussed above, MRC might act in a
coordination role, an execution role or a facilitation or cooperative
role for a specific need within a larger activity funded by others.
All activities would be implemented by some national institution to
ensure 'ownership' of the output to enhance institutional
learning. MRC would cooperate with other development agencies and
financial institutions where this was to the benefit of member
nations, the institutions and where such cooperation contributes to
meeting the MRC mandate. Some activities would be funded under grants,
some as contracted activities and some in association with loan funds,
particularly loans such as the flexible facilities increasingly being
offered to enhance institutional learning and flexibility in
implementation.
Programme outputs would be evaluated to assess whether there
contribute to achieving the objective of AIP and implementation would
include a form a participatory monitoring and evaluation to facilitate
both programme management and impact monitoring.
Specific Examples of Activities or Projects that would contribute to
MRC
Water Use Efficiency
The primary technical focus of AIP lies in the area of water use
efficiency in the broad sense to include; water use in catchment areas
(for forests or agro forestry), upland cultivated areas (for tree
crops, rain fed agriculture), and irrigated agriculture, including
systems that might utilise or compete with fish).
Consideration of efficient water use necessarily involves
consideration of associated inputs, fertiliser, pesticides and
particular delivery equipment such as irrigation techniques and
altered landforms. It also must necessarily consider the effluent,
particularly pesticides that have off site impacts, resulting from
different ways of utilising water. These factors usually need to be
studied in 'real life' situations if data useful for planning is to be
obtained as only in this way will the many technical, economic and
social influences on water use be reflected in the results.
This ' real life' aspect of activities to address water use efficiency
can be obtained in different ways; by adding specific components to
address learning about water use (water user group processes) and
systematic data capture, to large projects involved in improving or
modernising irrigation funded by others by funding some such
irrigation modernisation schemes that exist in a land system with wide
relevance within the basin and where good systems and data about these
does not yet exist by adding specific components to address learning
and systematic data capture to large projects addressing sustainable
land use of critical catchments in the basin by funding specific
projects that address the requirement for sustainable land use in
critical catchments where these are not being adequately addressed by
others by commissioning particular research by appropriate
institutions to address particular needs in the basin where these are
not being addressed by others by funding particular projects to
introduce needed techniques under participatory action research
conditions where these are not being addressed by others, for example,
Integrated Pest Management (IPM) to reduce pesticide use and so
effluent
Catchment Management
The second key technical area of AIP is the institutionalisation of a
watershed catchment management perspective into planning for
agriculture in the basin. Watershed catchment management is a
particular approach to planning that emphasises the long-term
sustainability of human use of a region with relationship to the use
or manipulation of the water flowing through the area. It is designed
to systematically measure and consider impacts across a catchment or
sub-catchment, for example the effect of land use up stream on run-off
or infiltration and so agriculture downstream. It also makes explicit
the social impacts between different users of the basins water
resources such as, the cost to upland ethnic minorities of efforts to
change their land use to the benefit of downstream agricultural
people. Such knowledge can inform decisions about compensation or
assistance in voluntary relocation when such activities cannot be
self-sustaining or in the planning for activities to facilitate
desirable land use change that can be sustainable and attractive to
upland people who wish to remain in the upland areas.
Providing a 'catchment management' perspective in agricultural
planning and management can be achieved; directly through involvement
in planning activities in each country, where MRC has relevant data or
expertise, either on a provision of service basis or as executing
agent for a planning activity funded through MRC indirectly by adding
specific inputs into projects addressing human land use in critical
catchments to fill applied research or data collection needs necessary
for basin wide planning indirectly by undertaking participatory action
research projects in critical catchment areas to promote appropriate
agro forestry/ livestock or other sustainable land use and
particularly to incorporate ethnic minority interests and capabilities
into changes in land use indirectly by funding activities to develop
and introduce specialist equipment or techniques into high or mid
catchment areas in potentially critical areas to facilitate more
sustainable productive land and water use.
Data Collection and Dissemination
The third technical area of AIP leads from the first two technical
areas and in turn will contribute to later activities in these two
areas. The systematic collection and dissemination of data 'owned' by
each member nation. This is important for planning under WUP and BDP
as discussed above and in the long term 'to gain 20 years experience
rather than 4 years experience 5 times (the average length of a
project)'. While the long-term objective of this component is to build
the best database in the region, this would be achieved by addressing
specific needs rather than attempting to build a comprehensive library
within a specified period.
This objective can be achieved progressively; directly by
commissioning a study by relevant institutions in each MRC country to
obtain officially accepted data necessary for WUP, to identify data
gaps together with each nation so these can be filled by original work
or other means, to translate these data into other basin languages and
to make the data available by web and other media by providing a
ground truthing service for the GIS/ remote sensed mapping and
monitoring service through specific studies as requested by the GIS
service or other units in MRC or by studies on projects undertaken by
AIP to fill data gaps. indirectly by setting up systematic data
capture and data storage and dissemination on relevant projects or
programmes undertaken as discussed above or by others
Draft project proposals are attached to this report, these come either
from existing proposals or project ideas emerging from this analysis.
Cooperation with other activities within MRC
Sustainable catchment basin management principles require an
interdisciplinary approach to planning and so implementation of AIP
will necessarily require interface with other activities within
MRC. These areas of interaction are depicted in Figure
4.0. Interaction with WUP, BPP and the GIS database are discussed
above. Interaction with other specialised activities within MRC would
occur where information for planning required the estimation of 'trade
offs' between competing uses or coordinated action where complementary
use of resources was indicated. Other input would involve data
collection for other technical units, such as the environment
programme or where assistance from another unit was necessary for some
activity involving agriculture, eg to negotiate 'free passage' for
inputs and outputs or to improve associated navigation. This would be
carried out on a needs basis as mutually agreed between the technical
units.
Risks
The project strategy depends upon the active cooperation of line
ministries in each MRC country. It is anticipated that this will be
undertaken on a day to day basis by the NMC office in each
country. Although there is agreement at high level that such
cooperation will be given for MRC activities, there is a risk that
this cooperation may not be smooth at the operational level in the
following ways; data and reports available in each country may not be
made available easily internet and web based information exchange may
not be facilitated in each country telecommunication facilities may
not be made available even if funds are provided
These potential problems are relevant to most MRC activities and the
solution(s) may need patient follow up.