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Irrigated agricultural ecosystems in Asia
Thierry Facon
Senior Water Management Officer
FAO - Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific
Asia
• Two transitions:– structural transformation of agriculture – transition to sustainable agriculture
• Farmers have the same aspirations as we do for our family and their future (educated, healthy, wealthy)
• Sustainability and equity
Irrigation?
• Irrigation development has been a backbone of poverty reduction and rural development in Asia
• The future role of irrigation in the changing economic and ecological landscapes will depend on livelihood contexts in a given rural setting
• It must be responsive to the dual transitional dilemma Asia faces today
• How the sector will manage these transitional challenges is the central question
Explicitly addressing policy dilemmas, trade-offs and difficulties
• Managing transitions: resilience, transformation or exit strategies?
• Managing the informality of the water economies• Economic water productivity vs. equity and other
strategic goals• National vs. local and river basin objectives • “ideal” vs. Plan B and second-best options • Realistic financial arrangements for water operators:
smart subsidies?
Agricultural transformation
• Three interrelated transformations driven by both global forces and local context: – Structural, – Agricultural, and – Dietary
• Agriculture, through higher productivity, provides food, labour and even financial resources for the processes of urbanization and industrialization.
• A dynamic agricultural sector raises labour productivity in the rural economy, pulls up wages and gradually eliminates the worst dimensions of absolute poverty. (Timmer)
Changing rural livelihoods
Source: World Bank (2008).
A vibrant neo-agriculture should be the priority for future rural poverty reduction, rather than looking at agriculture and irrigation
in isolation
• The era of agriculture-led poverty alleviation of the past is gradually transforming to more diversified forms of livelihood strategies.
• Future water interventions should respond and adjust to these changes and redefine their space in the broader context of urbanization, industrialization and environmental concerns.
• Potential water interventions in Asia will largely be ‘management-driven’ rather than development-driven both in surface and groundwater schemes.
• Greater attention to building resilience against water vulnerabilities and the impacts of climate change.
• More demand-based flexible water control systems and multiple-use water services.
• While the dynamics of agriculture and water management and their linkages to rural livelihoods continue to change, poverty and rural livelihood issues have also gradually moved out of the agrarian domain as more diversified livelihood patterns emerge.
• Look at how best to integrate agriculture into the wider economy as a way of stimulating production and consumption linkages and promoting rural change.
Future of Irrigation in Asia
Practical implications for staple crops: economies of scale
• Staples will still be the bulk of agricultural production • The ‘farm income question’ – how much farm does a family
need?– Land consolidation and expansion of farm sizes– Countries have to adopt policies addressing that question
• Strengthened cooperation among farmers
• Rural populations need better opportunities for employment outside agricultural production
• Avoid disruptions in livelihoods - balancing exit rate from agriculture and the absorptive capacity of the economy
• Territorial approaches for multi-sectoral strategies
The potential of non-farm sectors to support a more sustainable irrigation: a broader outlook
Financing and multiple roles
• Modernization should aim to secure reliable, equitable and predictable water supply and be responsive to individual needs of farmers where possible. Trust farmers to respond to such a water supply, e.g., through conjunctive water use.
• Water-delivery systems need to be flexible
(technically, institutionally) to deliver water to multiple uses (agriculture, environment, city, industry, energy generation), from entire river basins down to (within) large irrigation systems.
• Financing (capital and O&M) needs to progressively move from subsidies to market-based incentives, and public-private cost-sharing mechanisms, as economies evolve (Early -> Transition -> Post-agriculture).
• "Early economies" should anticipate for, "transition economies" should plan for, and "post-agriculture economies" should harmonize (social, cultural, institutional, and policy) water management for different ecosystem services within irrigation area and catchment.
Financing and multiple roles
Conclusion
• New layers of complexity have been added to our understanding of irrigation and need to be managed.
• Unless management adapts, the discrepancy between stated and actual management will widen: chaos will increase, etc.
• Modernization to increase flexibility, in river basin management context, delivering services needed by farmers, taking into account multiple functions, is more required than ever.
