An old–new measure of canal water inequity

Abstract

The fixed-turn or warabandi system of irrigation management is aimed at providing equitable rationing of Pakistan’s limited water resources. This paper assesses the equity in practice of the warabandi system using the Gini and Theil indices. Defining equity as the delivery of an equal depth of water over the irrigated area for a crop season, distribution is relatively equitable at the distributary level. There is a need for improved indices that represent inequity and the difference between canal capacity and operational flows. This is particularly important for canals in the low- and lowest-priority subsets of the warabandi schedule.

Keywords:

• equity
• Gini
• Theil
• Hakra
• Pakistan
• warabandi

Acknowledgement

The International Water Management Institute is in receipt of financial support from the Embassy of the Kingdom of Netherlands, Islamabad, Pakistan (through Grant No. 22294), which was in part used to support this study. The data for the case study were provided by the Project Monitoring Implementation Unit; Executive Engineer (Hakra); and Superintending Engineer (Bahawalnagar) of the Irrigation and Power Department, Government of Punjab, Pakistan. The study design, data collection, analysis, and interpretation of the results are exclusively those of the authors.