Is investing in Canal Irrigation a Bad Idea? : Daily Current Affairs

Date: 25/08/2022

Relevance: GS-3: Major cropping patterns in various parts of the country, different types of irrigation and irrigation systems storage

Key Phrases: Water Accounting Method, Sluggish Development of Canal Irrigation, Major and medium irrigation Projects, Notional Cropping Pattern, Diversion of Canal Water, Canal Command Areas

Context:

India is one of the countries with the largest number of dams and canal irrigated areas.
However, due to the sluggish development of canal irrigation in recent times, its poor performance is being criticised contending that the investment in canal irrigation is wasteful.

Key Highlights:

Long before the British Raj, India was a pioneer in canal irrigation by building dams across rivers.
After Independence, considering the importance of canal irrigation, the Central and State governments have given increased thrust to its development.
To alleviate the scarcity of foodgrains experienced during the 1950s and 1960s, huge investments were made by the Central Government to build dams to increase the production of foodgrains through canal irrigation.
Of the total investment (₹1,960 crores) made in the First Five-Year Plan (1951-56), more than 85 percent was spent on major and medium irrigation (MMI) projects alone.
Similar emphasis on the construction of dams was placed from the Second to the Eleventh Plan (2007-12).

Do you know?

A canal is an artificial channel that is constructed to carry water to the fields to perform irrigation.
The water is taken either from the river, tank, or reservoirs.
The canals can be constructed either by means of concrete, stone, brick, or any sort of flexible membrane which solves the durability issues like seepage and erosion.

Advantages of canal irrigation:

Development of un-irrigated wasteland.
Dangerous droughts can be avoided that expedite economic development.
The water requirement of crops during fluctuation in rainfall intensity can be met by having a proper irrigation system.
Compared to conventional watering, higher productivity per hectare of land is obtained due to canals.
Canal irrigation does not let the water table level go down. It only helps to increase the water level thus facilitating the digging of wells.
Canals also serve the purpose of hydroelectricity, drinking water supply, fishery development, and navigation.

Disadvantages of canal irrigation are:

Any imbalance in the water distribution process results in a scarcity of water in some areas and water clogging in other areas.
This makes the soil unproductive due to the movement of harmful underground salts and alkalies to the surface level.
Water present stationary in the canal results in the growth of worms, mosquitoes, and insects.
Improper maintenance results in the collection of sediments in the canals that in turn affects the capacity of the canal.
Canal construction demands economic investment and time.

As a result, the area irrigated by canal increased from 71 lakh hectares during 1950-51 to 144 lakh hectares during 1980-81.
In these 30 years, the share of public canals in the net irrigated area under all sources of irrigation also increased from 34 to 37 percent.
The area irrigated by government canals continued to increase in the next decade and reached a peak level of 173 lakh hectares by the year 1991-92.
However, in this period, groundwater irrigation expanded at a much faster rate than canal irrigation.
After 1991-92, the area under canal irrigation at the national level stagnated for about eight years and then followed a steep decline and reached the bottom level of 138.7 lakh hectares in the year 2002-03.

There was some recovery in the next four years, which was again followed by stagnation and a small decline.
The net result is the net irrigated area under canal hovered around 160 lakh hectares during 2011-12 to 2014-15, which is 10 lakh hectares less than what was achieved 20 years back.
The percentage of canal irrigation area to total irrigated area in the country has fallen to less than 25% at present.

Why are there serious criticisms about this form of irrigation?

In States like Tamil Nadu, Punjab, and Kerala, the canal irrigated area declined drastically.
While Tamil Nadu’s irrigated area decreased from 9.03 lha to 5.84 lha, Punjab’s declined from 21.53 lha to 11.57 lha, and Kerala’s from 1.46 lha to 75,000 ha.

From 82.9 lha in 1950-51, the net canal irrigated area reached a peak of 174.53 lha in 1990-91.
Since then, its irrigated area has not grown much as per the data published by the Ministry of Agriculture.
Contrary to this, the data released by the Central Water Commission shows that the potential utilised under MMI projects increased from 97.1 lha in 1951 to 382.8 lha in 2018.
That is, in 2018, a difference of almost 140 percent was noticed between the data released by the Ministry of Agriculture and the Central Water Commission.

Why is there such a big difference?

Generally, when a dam is constructed for irrigation purposes, a notional cropping pattern is prepared to estimate its irrigation potential.
Accordingly, in a canal irrigation scheme, only certain crops should be cultivated with a certain percentage of area.
But the notional cropping pattern is seldom followed in most canal command areas in India.
Government departments that publish data on net canal irrigated areas do not publish gross canal irrigated areas regularly.
Therefore, a huge difference exists in the published data.

Reasons for declining canal irrigated area:

Diversion of canal water for other uses:
- After 1990-91, the water originally allocated for irrigation purposes has increasingly been diverted to domestic and other requirements because of fast economic growth and urban agglomeration.
- For example, it is alleged that more water is being taken from Kadakvasala dam to Pune city and from Krishna Raja Sagar dam to Bengaluru and Mysuru in recent years.
- Although the water withdrawal for domestic and other needs has been increasing every year, no Central ministry publishes data on this.
Water-intensive crops:
- After 1990-91, citing the price and market-related reasons, farmers have been increasingly cultivating water-intensive crops like paddy, sugarcane, banana, etc.
- As a result, farmers located in the tail-end of the canal command area do not get an adequate amount of water.
Over-exploitation of canal water by sugar mills:
- Sugar mills are also responsible for declining canal irrigated areas.
- A report by the World Bank (2002) underlines that sugarcane, which accounts for only 3 percent of the total cultivated area in Maharashtra, consumes two-thirds of its water.
- Diverting water by constructing wells illegally near the canal and transporting water through long pipelines to distant fields are taking place increasingly in recent years.
- These are not accounted for under the canal irrigated area.

Way Forward:

One of the main reasons why canal irrigation is criticised is because there is no proper water accounting method.
The introduction of the canal water accounting method in Maharashtra in 2000 resulted in a huge increase in water use efficiency.
Therefore, the water accounting method should be introduced in all canal command areas, as it will reveal how much water stored in the dams has been used for what purpose, its efficiency, and the real status of the canal area.

Conclusion:

The canal irrigation sector faces many problems including low investment efficiency, poor financial recovery, and low water use efficiency.
But, the sluggish trend in the development of canal irrigation happens mainly due to data problems and violation of notional cropping patterns.
Without proper analysis of the data, it is not correct to say that investment in canal irrigation is ‘throwing good money after bad’.

Source: The Hindu BL

Mains Question:

Q. Due to the sluggish development of canal irrigation in recent times, its poor performance is being criticised contending that the investment in canal irrigation is wasteful. In this context, analyse the reasons for the same and suggest the way forward for an efficient canal irrigation system. (250 words).