Differential impacts of an irrigation project: Case study of the Swar Dam Project in Yedashe, Bago region of Myanmar

Abstract

In Myanmar, the government has made a vast investment in the construction of dams to improve crop productivity and to ensure socioeconomic development. This study explores the differential impacts, in terms of socioeconomic conditions, of these investments for paddy farmers in Yedashe Township, in the Bago region in the south-central part of Myanmar. A farm survey among 95 respondents is used to compare the situation before and after the construction of a dam. It is observed that after the installation of the dam, the farmers could practice double rice cropping enabling them to gain higher income. The impact of the dam project on the employment rate, paddy yields and incomes were measured using normalized vector equations. A positive effect on all these factors was observed. The incomes of the farmers increased by benefiting from higher crop productivity, more crops per year, and more benefits over variable costs. However, the return above variable cash costs (RAVCC) and the benefit over cost (BC) ratio of head-end users was significantly higher than that of middle-reach and tail-end users. Therefore, the study additionally explored the problems of unequal water access and farmer-oriented solutions to these problems. The lack of monitoring and management of the irrigation institutions was found to be a major constraint for the development of the irrigation sector. Therefore, efficient utilisation of irrigation water by water-users, and policies as well as investments in the development of irrigation infrastructure need to be emphasised.

Decadal changes in the rice-cropping system in the Ayeyarwady Delta using a large archive of satellite imagery from 1981 to 2020

“…Irrigation increases the production capacity and provides benefit to famers in terms of the investment costs per hectare. However, insufficient rice production was reported among farmers immediately after the launching of irrigation facilities, and the lowest rice production occurred at the tail-end farms with difficult access to water resources (Oo et al 2017). Generically, summer crop can be more productive than monsoon crop when grown under irrigated conditions because of the increased hours of sunshine.…”

“…Overall, with the combination of supportive policies and technologies, rice production has increased over several decades (Garcia et al 2000). However, the implementation of irrigation facilities did not necessarily guarantee higher returns to farmers because they incurred more cost for water resources (Oo et al 2017). Competition for water resources is common during the dry season, especially where there is a limited regulation and an absence of cooperative water management.…”

Climate Change Adaptation and the Agriculture–Food System in Myanmar

“…Due to the deterioration of the watersheds, only 25% of these dams could function properly for either agriculture purposes or the generation of electricity. Recent investigations question the lack of access to water from irrigation projects despite the abundance of water resources and irrigation dams across the country [28][29][30].…”

Agricultural land and crop production in Myanmar

“…The Dry Zone is the most water stressed of Myanmar's AEZs. Significant attention was given to investments in irrigation expansion in the Dry Zone, particularly in the 1990s, mainly motivated by the prospect of increased paddy production (Aung et al 2017, Boutry et al 2017).…”