INTRODUCTION - Sustainable Irrigation Development in the White Volta Sub-Basin - page 3

reaching as high as 85%-90% in parts of Africa, Asia and the Middle East
(Shiklomanov and Rodda, 2003).
The increasing competition for water as a result of increasing agricultural
production needs to be managed efficiently. Recent trends in managing
competing water uses have been to promote river basin organisations where
water is managed at the basin level. There is general agreement on the long-
term benefits of effective integrated management of river basins, especially
with increasing competition and environmental degradation (Merrey et al.,
2007). In many developing countries small-scale irrigation farmers are under
threat from other sectoral demands for water considered of higher economic
value. This threatens the livelihoods of millions of small farmers in
economies with few alternative sources of employment (Svendsen, 2005). An
externally imposed ‚one-size-fits-all‛ strategy for managing such complexity
is unlikely to be effective. Policies emphasizing public management,
community-level collective action and private sector roles follow different
institutional approaches, but share several tendencies (Merrey et al., 2007).
Knowledge of the hydrological impact of up-scaling irrigated agriculture on
downstream users will be essential for decision making and negotiating
tradeoffs between competing water uses.
This study aims at helping to achieve sustainable irrigation in sub-Saharan
Africa, through gaining a better understanding of productive irrigation water
use and effective management of irrigation development.
1.2 R EVIEW OF I RRIGATION D EVELOPMENT IN
SUB -S AHARAN A FRICA
Irrigation systems in many developing countries were established with the
assumption that enhanced financial gains from improvements in productivity
levels would be sufficient to meet the operation and maintenance costs. This
assumption has very often proved unfounded; public irrigation systems in
developing countries have seldom performed to their design potential (Shah
et al., 2002).
Reviews help in assessing past and existing situations which inform decision
making to achieve improvement. Review of irrigation development can (1)
confirm some earlier findings and disprove some popularly-held notions and
incorrect perceptions; (2) provide empirical support to some existing
irrigation investment policies and suggest reconsidering others; and (3)