big data, big productivity gains: is it so simple in water management?

Big data, big productivity gains – is it so simple in water management?

Water for Food Seattle, October 2014

Jeremy Bird International Water Management Institute

Photo: IWMI

How transferable are ‘first-world’ solutions…… is there scope for ‘leapfrogging’

UNITING AGRICULTURE AND NATURE FOR POVERTY REDUCTION

Drones for monitoring

Photos: CIP

Photo: IWMI GRanD Unit

Satellite controlled water management?

UNITING AGRICULTURE AND NATURE FOR POVERTY REDUCTION

Pennan Chinnasamy, IWMI

GRACE – Similar opportunities in emerging economiesMonitoring of recharge dams, Gujarat

UNITING AGRICULTURE AND NATURE FOR POVERTY REDUCTION

Drought Monitoring in Sri Lanka

• SPEI (Standardised Precipitation –Evapotranspiration Index) to determine the onset, duration and magnitude of drought conditions

• Potential to inform inter-basin transfers , crop choice ….

Drought Index using SPEI

IWMI - 2014 Drought in Kurunegala District

Big data will make a big difference … …but many of the intractable problems on

water management need a better understanding of the changing institutional and socio-cultural context

Informal canal diversion around automatic gate

Photo: IWMI Cairo

‘Illegal’ interventions

Photos: IWMI Cairo

Participatory Irrigation Management - mixed success and failure

• PIM – was the paradigm for irrigation management

• emerging evidence that PIM schemes are failing when financial support is withdrawn

Region Success Failure

S Asia 18 20

E Asia 7 2

SE Asia 12 24

C Asia 4 14Source: Mukherji, IWMI

Over abstraction of groundwater

Perverse subsidies on electricity for agriculture led to over- abstraction of groundwater

1950-51

1954-55

1958-59

1962-63

1966-67

1970-71

1974-75

1978-79

1982-83

1986-87

1990-91

1994-95

1998-99

2002-03

2006-07(p)0

5000

10000

15000

20000

25000

30000

35000

40000

45000

Groundw

ater

Canal

Tanks

Tushaar Shah, IWMI

Points to the need for questioning what data we need to inform change….

….its relevance, intensity and quality….not just data because it is there

Photo: Hamish John Appleby

UNITING AGRICULTURE AND NATURE FOR POVERTY REDUCTION

Merti Aquifer, Kenya

Identify uncertainties and risk in decision variables

Compute value of additional information

Probabilistic outcomes for different groups

What data and how much?

Keith Shepherd, ICRAF

Infographic: Rachel Cramer, IWMI

Canal monitoring in Pakistan – on the ground data

Photos, IWMI Pakistan

Ground truthing and understanding the reasons behind good or poor performance

Aditi Mukherji, IWMI

Understanding trends : Feminization and ageing of agricultural population

1 million Nepali migrants in 2004 - 97% were male. World Bank. 2009

26% of Nepalese households are headed by females. 2011 Census

World’s farming population is ageing – average age approaching 60 Trends towards consolidation of land in China, Korea, Malaysia…

IWMI, Nepal; WLE

Some options for…

….incorporating gender in planning ….irrigation management….natural resources management….flood and drought management….transboundary management

UNITING AGRICULTURE AND NATURE FOR POVERTY REDUCTION

Incorporate gender diverse perceptions into landscape modeling

Photo: Scott Miller

3-D participatory mapping

Gender Mapper and Gender Profiles

UNITING AGRICULTURE AND NATURE FOR POVERTY REDUCTIONPhoto: Birhanu Zemadim

Citizen Scientists

2006

Nepal

2012

Global irrigation mapping: dramatic improvements in resolution

Salman Siddiqui, et a

IFPRI, 2012

FAO, 2012

Altchenko and Villholth, 2014

Resource potential (e.g., groundwater)

INCREASING WATER AND LAND PRODUCTIVITYInvesting in sustainable access to supplementary irrigation - data underpins business models and policy change

Photo: IWMI

UNITING AGRICULTURE AND NATURE FOR POVERTY REDUCTION

K. Umarov WUA, Fergana Province

Using SMS to improve irrigation scheduling procedures - Uzbekistan

Photos: IWMI

UNITING AGRICULTURE AND NATURE FOR POVERTY REDUCTION

Analyze irrigation system bureaucracies and pathways to reform.

Reconfigure irrigation benchmarking

Explore roles of ‘new data’ in irrigation management

Re-examine storage options – surface, subsurface

Test alternative financing models

Build on successful public/private sector models

Not just about data – need to re-examine public irrigation models

Tushaar Shah, S Prathapar IWMI

• Groundwater reserves in Africa are many times greater than surface water

• Mapping techniques plus ground truthing show potential

Big data approaches could help with the development of sustainable groundwater use in Africa

Source: Karen Villholth , IWMI

Big data supports an ecosystemsapproach to landscape management

• Sudd wetland in South Sudan - twice the size of Spain

• Upstream hydrological construction could impact floods, which feed the Sudd

Photo: JAXA; Analysis: Rebelo, IWMI

Historic flood analysis informs future flood planning

Historic analysis available from 2000 Giriraj Amarnath, IWMI

Concept: Index Based Flood Insurance

Peoples Participation

Flood map

Scaled for Depth

Scaled for Duration

Final IndexMap

Flood Indexing Concept

Flood Hazard Model

Flood Loss Model

Flood Insurance Policy

Partner: IWM

Mobile Apps– Operational Flood Information Management

“Project outcomes to target thousands of

farmers get access to right information at right time

on flood risks and opportunities from flood

recession agriculture”

Photo: Thor Windham-Wright, IWMI

• IWMI, UNESCO-IHE, FAO partnership• public domain data repository for

monthly water accounts of river basins. • range of ‘Accounting’ sheets such as

agricultural production, ecosystem services, useable flows and groundwater depletion

Product – Water Accounting Plus

Dry season water levels, Chiang Saen Nov ‘13-May ’14 Source: MRC

How can ‘big data’ improve transboundary cooperation?

Urban nutrient balance ….waste as an asset

UNITING AGRICULTURE AND NATURE FOR POVERTY REDUCTION

CGIAR Research Program Water Land and Ecosystems

Sustainable intensification providing a pathway for agriculture productivity, human development and resilient landscapes

WLE - Thematic and focal region focus

www.iwmi.orghttp://wle.cgiar.org

IWMI - looking forward to cooperation with DWFI