High-yielding capacity building in irrigation system management: targeting managers and operators

✍ Scribed by Thierry Facon; Daniel Renault; P. S. Rao; Robina Wahaj

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2008
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 142 KB
• Volume: 57
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1531-0353
• DOI: 10.1002/ird.434

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

Irrigation management is facing complex challenges evolving with the transformation of agriculture, competition over resources, environmental concerns, without forgetting the critical objective of food production. Managers are ill prepared to meet these challenges and the FAO called for and initiated a massive retraining programme of engineers and managers on irrigation system modernization to address these issues, starting in Asia. Results from this first generation of interventions confirmed the lack of success of many investments and institutional reforms, gaps in capacity and training and the potential for achieving significant improvements at minimal cost by focusing on system operation. The FAO prepared new guidelines for improving system operation and management (MASSCOTE) based on service‐oriented management concepts, tested them through training workshops in Nepal, India and China and is disseminating them through a second‐generation training programme building on first‐ generation knowledge synthesis. This paper presents the FAO's strategic approach to capacity building on service‐oriented management. It builds on the major lessons drawn from past programmes and is based on three interrelated thrusts: at the system, state and regional/global levels. Concepts, methodologies, lessons learned on upscaling to policy and long‐term investment planning, limitations and conditions for success and future programme development are discussed. Copyright © 2008 Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.