Workshop On Water Use Efficiency and Productivity (Amman, September 30

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Workshop On Water Use Efficiency and
Productivity(Amman, September 30 October 4,
2005)

• Reflections on the Status of On-Farm Water-Use
  Efficiency in Selected Countries of West Asia
• Presenter
• M.E.Osman
• Team Leader
• Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development
  Team
• SDPD,ESCWA-Beirut
• E-Mail osmanm_at_un.org

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Introduction

• Improving water-use efficiency and productivity
  on a sustainable basis is an enormous challenge
  for the water stress and scarce countries of
  Western Asia.
• The average water-use efficiency for the sector
  as a whole is around 40 per cent.
• Information on on-farm water-use efficiency is
  limited, if available at all.
• It does not precisely reflect the complex
  production decisions at the farm level under
  different environmental, technological and
  economic conditions.

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• The purpose of this presentation is to share with
  you the methodology and findings of the six case
  studies on assessing the status of on-farm
  water-use efficiency conducted by ESCWA in
  collaboration with ICARDA in selected sites of
  four countries namely, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan and
  the Syrian Arab Republic.
• For the purpose of the analysis, on-farm
  water-use efficiency is defined as the ratio of
  the required amount of water to the actual amount
  of water-used.
• Water productivity is simply defined as the
  amount of production per unit of water applied in
  the field.
• Agricultural productivity and competitiveness in
  the region is adversely affected by water
  scarcity
• and land degradation.

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Irrigation Water Use for selected ESCWA countries
in the Year 2000
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Meeting the Challenges of Agriculture in West Asia

• The relative importance of agriculture in the
  West Asia region and its contribution to the
  national economy has gradually declined over the
  years.
• Agriculture contributes by 8 per cent to total
  GDP
• and by 24 per cent to total labor force in the
  region.
• 44 per cent of the population is still rural.
• Agricultural trade deficit amounts to US 15.5
  billion.
• Agricultural exports could only finance 25 per
  cent of the cost of the total agricultural
  imports .

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Meeting the Challenges of Agriculture in West Asia

• How to maintain the viability of the agriculture
  sector while safeguarding the sustainability of
  the scarce natural resources, mainly land and
  water.
• Maintaining water quantity and quality .
• The region has scarce water resources and limited
  fertile land subject to degradation.
• Owing to the rapid population growth and
  irregular rainfall patterns, the demand for water
  is seriously exceeding the supply of available
  water resources.

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Meeting the Challenges of Agriculture in West Asia

• Despite the water scarcity challenges, most
  countries of the region do not treat water as a
  scarce resource.
• Water scarcity is the single most important
  resource management challenge in the region.
• Thus, prudent use of water is becoming an
  immediate necessity.
• Incoherent agricultural and natural resources
  policies have further contributed to the
  depletion of land and water resources in many
  countries in the region.

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Water Scarcity

• As per the rule of thumb developed by water
  analysts, countries with fresh water resources of
  1,000 to 1,600 cubic meters per capita per year
  face water stress, with major problems occurring
  in drought years. When the annual internal
  renewable water resources are less than 1,000
  cubic meters per capita per annum, then these
  countries are considered water scarce. Below
  this threshold (500 cubic meters per capita per
  annum), water availability is considered a severe
  constraint on socioeconomic development and
  environmental quality.
• - By the above yardstick, West Asia is a water
  scarce region. Figure 1, reflects on per capita
  water availability in the countries of West Asia
  .

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Figure 1 Water Per Capita in theWest Asia Region
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Land Scarcity

• The region also has limited fertile land subject
  to different levels of degradation (figures, 2, 3
  and 4).

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Figure 2 Land Use in the West Asia Region
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Figure 3 Categories of Dryland Areas in the West
Asia Region
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Figure 4 Status of Land Degradation in the West
Asia Region
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• If one applies the conservative benchmark of land
  scarcity set at 0.07 hectares of arable land per
  capita (Engelman and LeRoy, 1995), only Iraq, the
  Syrian Arab Republic and Saudi Arabia and Lebanon
  will not be classified as land scarce countries,
  Figure 5.

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Figure 5 Per Capita Cultivated Land Availability
in the West Asia Region
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Concepts, Methods and Data Requirements for
Assessing On-Farm Water-Use Efficiency

• On-farm water-use efficiency is defined as the
  ratio of the required amount of water (to produce
  a target output level) to the actual amount of
  water applied by farmers. Based on this
  definition, on-farm water-use efficiency may take
  the value of less than one, greater than one or
  equal to one.
• Water productivity is simply defined as the
  amount of production per unit of water applied in
  the field.

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ON-FARM WATER USE EFFICIENCY

• WUE 1 Perfect Efficiency
• WUE lt 1 Over Irrigation
• WUE gt 1 Under Irrigation

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Identification of Appropriate Methodology

• Three models of water use (allocation)
• Variable-input model
• Wi f ( Pi , r , rw , ni x )
• Fixed, allocatable- input model
• Wi f ( P , r , n1 , n2 , , nm , W x )
• Behavioral model
• Wi f ( ni x)

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• - P is a vector of crop prices which are given
  to producers
• - pi is price of crop i (i 1,,m) w is water
  price
• - r is a vector of variable input prices other
  than water (v 1,,z))
• - wi is water allocated to crop i
• - W is farm-level quantity of water
• - ni is land allocated to crop i
• - x is a vector of variables taken as given in
  the short run (e.g., crop-level irrigation
  technology and weather).

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Data Requirements

• Data was collected using on-farm survey
• Main categories included
• Crop-level acreage use
• Crop-level water use
• Farm-level water use
• Crop-level output prices
• Crop-level inputs use and prices
• Farm-level water price/cost
• Socio-economic characteristics of farmers
• Irrigation technology
• Soil characteristics
• Rainfall,

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WATER USE EFFICIENCY
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Six Case Studies of Selected ESCWA Countries

• Three specified models of fixed-allocatable input
  model, variable input model and behavioral model
  were estimated for each case study.
• On-farm water-use efficiency was defined as the
  ratio of the required amount of water (to produce
  a target output level) to the actual amount of
  water applied by farmers.
• The target production levels for the crops
  studied were the average yield levels of the
  sample farms. To estimate the required amount of
  water to produce these average yield levels, the
  estimates of crop water-use equations were used.
  This was done by calculating the amount of water
  required for each crop at the mean levels of the
  independent variables appearing in that equation.

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The status of on-farm wateruse efficiency in the
Beni-Sweif area of Egypt

• Three specified models of fixed-allocatable input
  model, variable input model and behavioral model
  were estimated, using on-farm data of 50
  producers.
• Farmers in the Beni-Sweif area of Egypt
  over-irrigated all winter and summer crops by a
  large amount of water within a range of 25 to 44
  per cent .

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ACTUAL AND REQUIRED AMOUNTS OF WATER USE BY CROP
IN BENI-SWEIF, EGYPT
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The status of on-farm water-use efficiency in
Nubaria area of Egypt

• Three specified models of fixed-allocatable
  input, variable input and behavioral
  (satisficing) models were estimated using on-farm
  data of 50 producers.
• The crop with the minimum of over-irrigation by
  24 per cent was bersem. The crop with the highest
  level of over-irrigation by 53 per cent was
  squash.

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ACTUAL AND REQUIRED AMOUNTS OF WATER USE BY CROP
IN NUBARIA, EGYPT
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The status of on-farm water-use efficiency in the
Ninavah province of Iraq

• The data was collected from a cross-sectional
  survey of 284 farms in 20 districts in the
  Ninavah province in Northern Iraq.
• To obtain the required amount of water to produce
  the average yield levels, the estimated water
  demand equation with the fixed-allocatable input
  model was used.

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On-farm water-use efficiency in wheat production
in Ninavah province
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Effect of farm size on the efficiency of
water-use in wheat production in Ninavah province
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Impact of Supplemental Irrigation on Water
Productivity in Ninavah province
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The status of onfarm water-use efficiency in the
Rabea area of Iraq

• The sample farms comprised 100 producers located
  in a moderate rainfall zone.
• To obtain the required amount of water to produce
  these average yield levels, the estimated crop
  water-use equations with the three models were
  used.
• On-farm WUE was the highest for tomatoes (0.68),
  indicating that actual water use exceeded water
  requirements by about 32 per cent.
• The lowest WUE of 0.32 for sugar beet revealed
  that producers over-irrigate this crop
  considerably in other words, the sugar producers
  exceeded water requirements of the crop by 68 per
  cent.

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Actual and Required Amounts of Water Use by Crops
in Rabea, Iraq
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The status of on-farm water use efficiency in the
Ghors area of Jordan

• The sample farms in the Ghors area of Jordan
  comprised 70 producers, distributed among 23
  villages.
• The percentages of over-irrigation ranged from a
  minimum of 23 per cent for citrus to a maximum of
  70 per cent for wheat crop.

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ESTIMATED AND ACTUAL WATER USE IN THE GHORS
AREA, JORDAN
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Water Productivity in the Ghors area of Jordan
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The status of on-farm water-use efficiency in the
Radwania area of the Syrian Arab Republic

• The sample farms comprised 80 producers
  distributed among 24 villages.
• A low WUE of 0.45 for barley crop indicated that
  actual water use exceeded water requirement by 55
  per cent.
• Cotton crop, on the other hand, exceeded water
  requirement only by 24 per cent.

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Actual and Required Amounts of Water Use by Crops
in Radwania, Syria
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Conclusions and Recommendations

• The results obtained through the three models
  used in the case studies conducted jointly by
  ESCWA and ICARDA have important policy
  implications.
• Assessment of water-use efficiency at the farm
  levels determined a potential for improving
  water-use efficiency which could be tapped by
  sound policies and practices.
• The results by farm size showed that small,
  medium, and large farms have different potentials
  for improving their water-use efficiency.
• Similarly, the irrigation technology produced
  different levels of water use efficiency when
  applied.

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Conclusions and Recommendations

• The main difficulty encountered in such studies
  is the calculation of actual water-use, given the
  diversity at the farm levels with respect to
  source of water and irrigation technology.
• It is recommended to involve a
  multidisciplinary team comprised of different
  agricultural specialists, economists and
  sociologists in conducting and collecting farm
  survey data for conducting similar case
  studies.

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Conclusions and Recommendations

• Water shall be managed efficiently and on a
  sustainable basis.
• Access to water and other agricultural
  resources shall be available on an equitable
  basis and in a fair economic environment that
  shall provide opportunities for all.
• Agriculture has the potential for solving the
  problem of water scarcity through
• Improving irrigation efficiency by getting more
  crop per drop
• Technology, that offers modern methods for
  irrigating crops efficiently
• New strategies, innovative policies and
  approaches

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• Participatory research and extension strategies
• User friendly models for estimating crop water
  requirements on a regular basis
• Appropriate technologies for rainfed agriculture
• Sound agronomic practices
• Raising awareness and capacity building of
  stakeholders and
• Sharing of best practices and lessons learned.

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Thank You