ABOUT ICWC TRAINING CENTER ACTIVITY
International Conference “Strategy of sustainable irrigated farming development with realizable investments in drainage: Aral Sea basin, Central Asia” was held on 10-13 March 2004 in ICWC Training Center.
The conference organizers are the Ministry of Agriculture and Water Resources of Uzbekistan, SIC ICWC, IPTRID/FAO, Wallingford Institute of Hydrology (Great Britain), McGill University (Canada).
The conference participants were presented as heads, experts, leading specialists of water agencies in Central Asian countries, a number of international and foreign organizations (SIC ICWC, IPTRID/FAO, World Bank, Asian Development Bank, SDC, USAID, CIDA, Wallingford Institute of Hydrology, Alterra-ILRI, Waterwatch, Brace Center, VanS Consulting), representatives from the Embassies of the USA and Great Britain and the media of Uzbekistan.
The purpose of the conference was to analyze drainage situation in Central Asian states and develop proposals on strategy of sustainable irrigated farming development and agricultural production effectiveness improvement in the region.
Salinity control is one of the key irrigated land reclamation problems, which requires artificial drainage as a necessary stipulation of sustainable irrigated farming development. Irrigated lands reclamation status worsening was a result of weakening attention to drainage. Consequently, a stable tendency of land degradation on a threatening scale was observed in the recent years. For 1990-1999, areas with high groundwater table (up to 2 m) increased from 1.29 to 1.57 million ha (or by 22%) in the Amudarya basin, and from 0.55 to 0.90 million ha (by 64%) in the Syrdarya basin.
The indicators of the following regions were above the average value for the whole region: Amudarya basin - Akhal (growth by 149%) and Dashoguz (31%) veloyats in Turkmenistan, Navoi (43%), Samarkand (24%), and Khorezm (22%) oblasts in Uzbekistan; Syrdarya basin – South Kazakhstan (growth by 200%), Jizak (84%), and Syrdarya (72%) oblasts in Uzbekistan.
Correspondingly, total area of moderately and strongly saline lands in the region increased sharply. For the indicated period, area of saline lands increased from 1.16 to 1.82 million ha (by 57%) in the Amudarya basin, and from 0.34 to 0.61 million ha (by 79%) in the Syrdarya basin.
Drainage performance for 1990-2000 reduced by 30%, and if this tendency remains, more than 50% of drainage systems in the region will be out of action completely by the middle of the 21st century. According to the estimations of leading experts, now losses from unsatisfactory drainage performance amount to about $1 billion per annum. Drainage situation in the region has a tendency to worsen in future.
The conference was opened by A. Jalalov, First Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Water Resources of Uzbekistan, Chair of NCID. In his paper, he dwelled on common problems of water sector development and infrastructure in the republic, qualitative characteristics of irrigated lands, place and role of drainage in improvement of their reclamation condition, necessity to comprehensively analyze the current drainage situation and define priority directions of investments in drainage.
The key papers were presented by Prof. V. Dukhovny (“Drainage in Central Asia”), Prof. Kh. Yakubov (SIC ICWC), A. Abirov, Manager of SANIIRI Drainage Division (“Current problems of vertical drainage exploitation”), M. Mirkhojiyev, Head of Department at the Ministry of Agriculture and Water Resources of Uzbekistan (“Ferghana Valley – problems and potential for future progress”), Dr. H. Denecke (“Prospects of irrigated farming development in the context of the conference”), Dr. A. Abdel-Dayem (“The World Bank Vision on Investments in Drainage Systems”), Prof. C. Madramoto (“Integrated Drainage and Irrigation Management”), Dr. J. Pearce (“Role of international programs in profits of beneficiaries”), Dr. V. Visfanatha President of VanS Consulting, Canada (“Review of potential Aral basin demands for drainage”).
The conference participants presented 12 papers on zones in the region that are typical in drainage context:
- Kazakhstan: Kzyl-Orda and South Kazakhstan oblasts;
- Kyrgyzstan: Osh oblast;
- Tajikistan: Sogd oblast;
- Turkmenistan: Tashkhavuz oblast;
- Uzbekistan: Ferghana Valley Bukhara, Kashkadarya, Syrdarya, Khorezm, Surkhandarya oblasts and the Republic of Karakalpakstan.
In irrigated zone, drainage network is a part of reclamation system, including also branched irrigation network, solving a complex of tasks, related to creating favorable water-salt regime for crop cultivation. In this connection, it was noted that it was necessary to review drainage problem in linkage with integrated water resources management (IWRM). Issues of collector-drainage network management should be included in IWRM concept.
In this respect, economic and resource aspects of IWRM include integration of water supply to irrigated lands and water disposal from them; interactions between various types of drainage (open, closed and vertical); use and management of surface, ground and return waters.
Matters were considered, which directly impact on the main parameters and life duration of collector-drainage systems: scientifically grounded limitation of water supply to irrigated lands in whole; reduction of losses in water allocation over inter-farm network; irrigated fields leveling and furrow length optimization; maximum reduction of releases from irrigated lands (following net norms); reduction of drainage load, in particular through applying sub-irrigation; openness and availability of information for all the concerned parties.
Opinions of the conference participants on organizational forms of joint drainage and irrigation management divided. While understanding in whole a need to impose obligation to manage drainage on water organizations (though in many cases borders of drainage and irrigation systems do not coincide), may be, on Water User Associations (WUAs), the following opinions took place:
- creating new structures for salt management is not expedient in the presence of WUAs; imposing these functions on them is natural (Tajikistan);
- status of water organizations will change with transition to IWRM; salt management should be imposed on them; it is important to develop economic instruments for motivating to improve reclamation condition of lands (Turkmenistan);
- exploitation of inter-farm drainage systems should be imposed on state organizations, and that of on-farm drainage systems is to be imposed on WUAs. But in the near 5-10 years farmers are not able to cope with drainage problem themselves (Uzbekistan).
Possibility of imposing in the future a task to manage salts (including on-farm collector-drainage network maintenance) on WUAs was supported by the representatives from Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan; successfully conducted market reforms in rural areas let rely on this. At the same time, it was underlined that at the beginning governmental support was required, because most farmers in chase of profit are focused on getting momentary benefits to the detriment of reclamation condition of lands. The government should undertake maintenance costs of large collector-drainage systems.
In the current conditions the countries in the region have not enough internal means to maintain stable drainage performance, but lack of attention to drainage problem is fraught with serious consequences. At present, irrigated lands not only in Amudarya and Syrdarya downstream areas (Dashoguz oblast in Turkmenistan, Karakaplakstan, Kzyl-Orda oblast in Kazakhstan), midstream area (Syrdarya, Jizak, Kashkadarya oblasts), but also in upstream area (Surkhandarya, Ferghana, Namangan oblasts in Uzbekistan, Khatlon, Sogd oblasts in Tajikistan) are affected by salinity. Dangerous sites of salinization have risen on irrigated land tracts, where sustainable land desalination was achieved earlier against the background of drainage (Maktaaral zone in South Kazakhstan oblast, Western part of Hunger Steppe in Uzbekistan).
The conference participants called public participation in this process as one of the important tasks in integrated irrigation and drainage management in the future. Examples were given when attracting attention of local authorities and water users in whole allowed to maintain drainage network in a sufficiently good condition.
As a result of funds shortage, a critical situation with all kinds of drainage — open, closed horizontal, vertical, combined — formed.
Year by year planned figures for cleaning open collector-drainage systems, especially on-farm ones, are not performed, preventive measures to maintain drainage working capacity are not carried out. Practically everywhere costs of operational measures are being reduced.
The papers of the conference participants, discussions of them, and opinion exchange allowed identifying urgent drainage problems in the region as a whole, as well as in separate zones unfavorable with respect to reclamation.
Taking into account the need for significant investments in drainage (according to some estimations, $2-3 billion in the next 20-30 years), the participants noted the importance of determining priorities of improving drainage situation in a short-, medium- and long-term scale to carry out:
- organizational measures: changing or reorganization of management structures, involving water users in salt management process;
- material and technical measures: appropriate equipment of laboratories, restoration of observation network, updating of technical base, wide application of GIS and so on;
- repair-and-renewal measures: introduction of prevention system, application of low-cost collector-drainage system maintenance and repair methods;
- agrotechnical measures: salt-resistant crops, crop rotations, biodrainage;
- water measures: use of drainage water for irrigation, subirrigation in lands with high fresh and poor saline groundwater table and others.
Taking into account financial resources and capital output ratio, the next order of investments in drainage by land categories was recognized expedient:
in a short term — poor saline lands, being on the verge of transition to moderately saline;
in a medium term — moderately saline lands, worsening most of all;
in a long term — strongly saline lands.
Reducing the amount of costs of operation, leaching and cleaning drainage and collectors to normative sizes, which will not allow reducing drainage working capacity more than by 60%, as the results of modeling showed, is more urgent. To provide high productivity of lands, it is necessary to immediately expand drainage reconstruction and restoration operations. Presumably, annual volumes of these operations should amount on average to $500-800 per a hectare of drainage areas being restored and modernized.
If reclamation condition of lands worsens in the future, its stabilization at the existing level and the task avoid the expansion of lands with higher salinity level should be a criterion of investment effectiveness.
In the context of low overall degree of agricultural education of land and water users after sharp increase in their amount, the meeting participants decided that it was necessary to develop education programs and hold special seminars for farmers.
The participants approved the presented draft proposals, developed by SIC ICWC to bring them to decision-makers. It was noted that in the current conditions when drainage problem was becoming keener it was necessary to attract attention of decision-makers at all levels of authorities (rayon, oblast, higher political governance), depending on complexity of drainage situation and territorial jurisdiction.
A number of foreign participants (Prof. C. Madramoto, Dr. H. Denecke, DR. A. Abdel-Dayem, Dr. J. Pearce) ensured that they would active participate in solving drainage issues in Central Asian countries and make every effort to attract donor funds to achieve these goals.
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