Establishment of water distribution scheduling and operation strategy for sustainability management of pilot irrigation scheme Mubuku area-Uganda : application case study

Abstract EN

In Uganda the agriculture practices is a rain-fed system using waters that are available during the rainy seasons, but the country faces two dry seasons where crops suffer sever shortages of water that affect their yields.

Water use for irrigation is among the technical options for enhancement of Water for Production in Uganda as set out in the Water Sector Strategic Investment Plan (WSSIP) 2009-2035.

However, there has been limited utilization of this option.

The supplementary irrigation activities is a resent intervention practices in Uganda, so many constraints could be expected when running such activities in the country.

This new strategy will efficiently and effectively supply water to meet the competing demands all year round.

Effective community mobilization is important to ensure adequate and effective participation of the beneficiaries in the development of schemes, and proper legally constituted organization is essential for beneficiary operation and management of irrigation schemes.

When there is already a form of irrigation in place still it is important that the farmer knows how much he/she has to irrigate and how often.

In most cases the water sources are scares and the users should make use of the water in an optimum way.

Therefore establishment of the water distribution schedule and basis for determining the allocation rights for the scheme is a must.

The Researcher (the Technical Advisor TA-MWE) insisted to provide on-job training of key staff in all aspects of the scheme especially the post construction management set-up and illustrates the prepared operational model (institutional and technical) for the scheme.

This strategy achieved the purpose of sustainable water use to improve production.

Due to water shortages in the dry period and related storage facilities in the scheme; the researcher designed a complete water distribution scheduling for the two project’s phases including the amount and related frequencies for Rice crop.

The operation of this irrigation scheduling was tested to ensure water equity between farms during the running of the training assessment program for the scheme as an activity of the TA-MWE for the target capacity development strategy in the MWE Irrigation Schemes.

One of the main findings from this applied research study is designing the required institutional management system in form of cooperative society for the scheme, this mechanism will guarantee scheme level’ accountability and regulation for institutional governance purposes with the business of irrigation scheme for both related management and technical aspects.

The needed scheme’s management structure was developed based on the value chain approach to ensure its sustainability.

It is strongly recommended that this application case study for a successful best practice of a supplementary irrigation project with its management strategy can be reviewed for disseminating in some Arab or Middle East Countries that have similar operation condition using the water harvesting techniques.