India
Presentation by ICIMOD and Helvetas on MUS integration in local water use master plan at different scales.
Poor people in developing countries need water for many purposes: for drinking, bathing, irrigating vegetable gardens, and watering livestock. However, responsibility for water services is divided between different government agencies, the WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) and irrigation sub-sectors, with the result that people's holistic needs are not met. Multiple use water services (MUS) is a participatory water services approach that takes account of poor people's multiple water needs as a starting point of planning, and the approach has been implemented in at least 22 countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America. Scaling up Multiple Use Water Services argues that by designing cost-effective multi-purpose infrastructure MUS can have a positive impact on people's health and livelihoods. It analyses and explains the success factors of MUS, using a framework of accountability for public service delivery, and it also examines why there has been resistance against scaling up MUS. A stronger service delivery approach can overcome this resistance, by rewarding more livelihood outcomes, by fostering discretionary decision-making power of local-level staff and by allowing horizontal coordination.This book should be read by government and aid agency policy makers in the WASH and agriculture sectors, by development field workers, and by academics, researchers and students of international development.
The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act of the Government of India provides a legal guarantee for 100 days of employment per year to adult members of any rural household willing to undertake public works at the prescribed minimum wages. Studies suggest that well over half of the assets created under Mahatma Gandhi Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MG-NREGS) are water-related and that while a significant proportion among these were possibly designed for single-use but de facto multiple use structures. Given its emphasis on decentralized, participatory planning processes, MG-NREGS may be viewed as the world’s largest laboratory for community-based MUS. This country-report focuses on exploring investment opportunities for the Rockefeller Foundation in the context of scaling up community-based MUS through MG-NREGS.
This video tells the story of many villages in Andhrah Pradesh and the changes related to water. Improvements were made over the years and now villagers do not have to go to the streams anymore to fetch their water. However these improvements have also brought along the problem of overexploitation of water supplies. Millions of boreholes were drilled, but the groundwater level continued to fall due to huge increases in the amount of groundwater pumped for irrigation.
One solution to the water resources problem, especially falling groundwater levels, is to harvest and use more water locally, this involves constructing farm ponds and check dams to increase recharge of groundwater. Such efforts are now widespread as part of the government and NGO supported watershed programmes. These watershed programmes are usually not targeted at improving the domestic water situation. Therefore good coordination is essential in order to properly budget the water taking into account population size, human and livestock drinking water requirements and irrigation demands.
This film was made for the Water, Households and Rural Livelihoods (WHIRL) Project, coordinated by the Natural Resources Institute (NRI), UK; Accion Fraterna A.P., India. The film is made by the Community Media Trust Pastapur, Andhrah Pradesh.
Powerpoint presentation given at the MUS group meeting in 2011 in Rome by Malik Ravinder of the International Water anagement Institute (IWMI) India, on integrating MUS in the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) in Madhya Pradesh, India.
Powerpoint presentation given at the MUS group meeting in 2011 in Rome by Shilp Verma of the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) India, on Participatory planning of water assets for multiple uses in the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MG-NREGS).
Powerpoint presentation given at the MUS group meeting in 2011 in Rome by Stef Smits, IRC, on elaborating a domestic use module to Mapping systems and Services for Multiple Uses (MASSMUS); case from Andhra Pradesh, India.
A study report published by and written on behalf of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
Mapping systems and Services for Multiple Uses (MASSMUS) is a module for assessing non-crop water uses in an irrigation scheme within the general approach developed by FAO for auditing the irrigation system management called MASSCOTE (Mapping Systems and Services for Canal Operation Techniques). The need to develop specific approach to multiple uses of water in an irrigation system stemmed from an analysis of 30 irrigation schemes, which revealed that non-crop water use and multiple functions of irrigation schemes were more of a norm than the exception.
The Krishna Western Delta System is located in South India in the state of Andhra Pradesh –on the right bank of the downstream stretches of the Krishna river, along the sea coast (Bay of Bengale). The climate of the Krishna Western Delta is dominated by the southwest monsoon which provides most of the precipitation for the region. The mean annual rainfall amounts to 800 - 900 mm, and about 90% of the rainfall is received during the monsoon months of May to October. The climate can be classified as sub-humid, with minimum and maximum average temperatures ranging from 12.8 to 26.0 °C and 29.7 to 46.5 °C respectively. [authors abstract]
In December 2010, a technical exchange visit was organised between FAO and IRC. The objective of this visit was to further develop the "domestic water supply and sanitation" component of the MASSMUS methodology for assessing multiple uses of water in large-scale irrigation systems. This component was field-tested in the Krishna Western Delta irrigation system, in Andhra Pradesh, India.
The main conclusions with respect to domestic uses is that the most important contributions irrigation makes to domestic supplies is through direct supply of bulk water to city, towns and villages from canals, and through indirect use of groundwater. This is to some extent reflected also in canal operation procedures, where priority is given to filling reservoirs and village tanks for domestic uses. However, domestic water users are not represented in the governance structure of the irrigation system. One area of concern is the lack of adequate wastewater management facilities. As a result, wastewater is used in an untreated manner for irrigation. Although the extent of this is limited compared to conventional irrigation practices, locally it represents an important source of water.
Apart from domestic uses, the KWD also supports other uses of water. These include food production, fish and aquaculture and animal husbandry. A relatively large part of water in the command area is consumed by natural vegetation. In terms of the value created by these different uses, the KWD shows a similar pattern as other similar irrigation systems in the region, with crop production representing 60% of the total value created, with the rest shared between the other uses.
Bharat Sharma (IWMI) presented experiences with MUS in the Northeastern Hills of India, drawing on earlier experiences in Nepal.
