Assessment of socioeconomic aspects in irrigation water use inefficiency in Sudan

Abstract

The River Nile State (RNS) of Northern Sudan can rightly be considered as a river-born nation with a high population density in the settled areas along the River Nile and Atbara River. The competition for irrigation water and land increases resource management complexity. The paper undertook the Elzeidab irrigated scheme of RNS as study area. The aim of this research is to assess the social and economical performance of the scheme’s tenants and to identify options to improve irrigation systems and water resource management. To realize these objectives structured survey questionnaires, field observations, and literature were used. A total of 70 randomly selected respondents from the Elzeidab scheme were interviewed. Integrated techniques involving economic and hydrologic components are used to assess water use efficiency in the RNS. Descriptive statistics and quantile analysis for crop water was applied and crop water requirements for Elzeidab field crops are presented. GAMS, Crop Wat4, and Cobb–Douglas function have been employed to evaluate the social and economical performance of the Elzeidab scheme tenants. The results suggest that vast irrigation water for agricultural production in the State coupled with low production will need attention on water management, allocation, quantities, and introduction of irrigation water saving technologies. Lack of tenants’ awareness led to inefficient water use. The paper concluded that in order to improve the economic and environmental performance of public pump irrigation schemes of the State, numerous challenges are needed to contribute to saving irrigation water in the future: institutional support (input supply, output marketing, and credit services), training of tenants on improved crop and water management issues, regular supervision, and monitoring of scheme activities are crucial.

Keywords:

• Socioeconomic behavior of tenants
• Water management
• Water saving