Training on tank and groundwater irrigation management for CNEARC students

A collective training course for CNEARC students from the 18th to 31st of march 2006 was organized by the team of « Water Management Programme » of IFP as part of a joint programme between IFP, the CNEARC (french tropical agronomy school in Montpellier), the University of Marrakech (Morocco) and the University of Pondicherry. This training was partly funded by the Agence Universitaire de la Francophonie (AUF). There were 11 French students and two teachers from CNEARC, as well as 5 students from the Master of Sustainable Development from Pondicherry University.

The training was about tank and groundwater irrigation management. We focused especially on : (i) understanding how the local bodies perceive projects and governmental policies on participatory management in irrigation, how they react and how they interpret the concept of groundwater recharge ; (ii) the study of the impact of these policies on the effective paticipation of local bodies on their collective resource’s management. The hypothesis was that the formalization of water users associations, though well accepted by farmers, is for them only a means to obtain finance from the government, but is not an encouragement to focus on water management nor to improve their participation and decision making

The students met different stakeholders of water management (engineers, NGOs Harvest and CERD, members of water users associations, non members farmers) and studied this water management, in small groups, in 4 villages : 2 located in Tamil Nadu, and two others located in Pondicherry where a tank rehabilitation project (TRPP) has been implemented since 1999.

A feedback was made to the interviewed persons at the end of the session, on the 31st of march 2006.

Organizers

French Institute of Pondicherry