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Middle East Water and Livelihoods Initiative (WLI) Improving Rural Livelihoods through Sustainable Water and Land-use Management in the Middle East Research Priorities for Water and Irrigation System Management on the Orontes Benchmark Site, Lebanon by: Roula Bachour, Utah State University Manal Al Arab, Utah State University Musa Nimah, American University of Beirut Mac McKee, Utah State University September, 2011

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Page 1: Research Priorities for Water and Irrigation System ... · PDF fileResearch Priorities for Water and Irrigation ... WATER, IRRIGATION, ... Successful strategies and technologies identified

Middle East Water and Livelihoods Initiative (WLI)

Improving Rural Livelihoods through Sustainable Water and Land-use Management in the Middle East

Research Priorities for Water and Irrigation System Management on the Orontes

Benchmark Site, Lebanon by: Roula Bachour, Utah State University Manal Al Arab, Utah State University Musa Nimah, American University of Beirut Mac McKee, Utah State University

September, 2011

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Table of Contents page LIST OF TABLES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . iii LIST OF FIGURES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . iv EXECUTIVE SUMMARY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . v INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Purpose and Objectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Overview of The Benchmark Area in Lebanon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Personnel and Procedures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 SUMMARY OF AVAILABLE DATA ON WATER AND IRRIGATION . . . . . . . . . 5 Available Secondary Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Primary Data Collection Efforts by ICARDA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Water Quality and Aquaculture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Proposed and Current Water, Irrigation, and Agricultural Projects in the Area . . . . . . 8 WATER, IRRIGATION, AND AGRICULTURAL PROBLEMS IN THE BENCHMARK AREA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Cost of Agricultural Production . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Other Constraints in the Agricultural Sector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Water Rights in Lebanon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Water Quantity Monitoring, Water Balance Estimation, and Water Management . . . . 12 Groundwater . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Local Irrigation Techniques . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Water Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

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Table of Contents (continued) page DATA GAPS AND RECOMMENDED APPLIED RESEARCH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Data and Knowledge Gaps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Recommendations for Applied Research in the Water Sector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Applied Research Project 1: Water Supply Assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Applied Research Project 2: Irrigation Information Support Service Center . . . . . 17 Applied Research Project 3: Irrigation Efficiency and Water Management . . . . . 19 Applied Research Project 4: Institutional Issues in Water Management in the Benchmark Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 Applied Research Project 5: Aquaculture Potential and Requirements for the Benchmark Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 Applied Research Project 6: Integrated Water Resources Management at the Basin-Scale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 CONCLUSIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 REFERENCES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 Appendix 1: Secondary Data Collected by the LARI Team . . . . . . . . . . . . . . unattached Appendix 2: Lebanese-Syrian Agreement about Orontes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . unattached Appendix 3: Details about the Orontes Transboundary Agreement with Syria . . . . . . . . 29 Appendix 4: Weather Data at Different Stations within the Orontes Watershed . . . unattached Appendix 5: Flood Risk Management El Qaa Watershed 15-01-09 . . . . . . . . . unattached Appendix 6: People Contacted . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

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LIST OF TABLES page Table 1: Major Springs in the Orontes River Watershed (LARI, 2010) . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Table 2: Average Orontes River Discharge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

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LIST OF FIGURES page Figure 1: Location of the Orontes River Watershed/Benchmark Area . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Figure 2: Areas in the Orontes Benchmark Site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Figure 3: Laboueh Canal delivering water to El-Qaa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Figure 4: Inefficient Irrigation of Water Melons with Groundwater, near El Qaa . . . . . . 13

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY During the summer of 2011, personnel from the Utah Water Research Laboratory (UWRL) at Utah State University (USU) and the American University of Beirut (UAB) conducted a survey of available water and agricultural data in the Orontes River Basin in Lebanon. The study also identified water-related problems in the area that are important for improving agricultural livelihoods in the region. These things were accomplished with funding from the Water and Livelihoods Initiative (WLI) conducted by the International Center for Agricultural Research in Dry Areas (ICARDA) and sponsored by the US Agency for International Development (USAID). The project took the form of a summer student exchange program whereby Ms. Roula Bachour, a PhD student in civil and environmental engineering from USU, worked during the summer in Lebanon with Ms. Manal Al Arab, a recent MS graduate of the American University of Beirut, to collect available data and identify and describe water-related problems in the Orontes Basin. To do this, they met with people who are knowledgeable about agricultural conditions and problems at the WLI benchmark site, including representatives of various government ministries, researchers, ICARDA personnel, farmers, and extensionists. This report represents the product of their work. It documents the data that are either available or currently being collected that could be used to better understand water-related agricultural problems in the area. It also summarizes gaps that will still exist in the available data, and it lists the most significant water management problems affecting agricultural livelihoods in the area that could be solved through applied research and successful outreach and extension activities. Finally, this report provides a list of six applied research projects that, if conducted, would move the region toward solutions for many of its water management problems. Fundamentally, water is a limiting resource with respect to increasing the profitability of agriculture in the Orontes Basin. However, its use in the basin is inefficient, especially in the agricultural sector. This inefficiency represents an opportunity to address a major factor that constrains opportunities for improving the livelihoods of people engaged in the agricultural sector. However, the ability of local water management institutions to deal with this issue is seriously limited by a near total lack of biophysical data on water and environmental conditions in the basin, by the limited capacity of local water management institutions--including many farmers--to adopt modern practices, and by a dysfunctional extension system that does a poor job of bringing the results of applied research to bear upon problems in the agricultural sector. To counter these problems, this report recommends the following series of six applied research projects that would improve water management in the region in ways that would increase the profitability of agriculture:

Applied Research Project 1: Water Supply Assessment Applied Research Project 2: Irrigation Information Support Service Center Applied Research Project 3: Irrigation Efficiency and Water Management Applied Research Project 4: Institutional Issues in Water Management in the Benchmark

Area Applied Research Project 5: Aquaculture Potential and Requirements for the Benchmark

Area Applied Research Project 6: Integrated Water Resources Management at the Basin-Scale

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INTRODUCTION The continuous increase in the use of the fresh water, combined with the degradation of agro-ecosystems, presents a serious challenge to farm households in rural communities that depend predominantly on land productivity for their livelihoods. This situation is worsening because of population increase, growth in agricultural, industrial, and urban demands, improvement in the standard of living, and pollution of water resources. Funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), and managed by the International Center for Agricultural Research in Dry Areas (ICARDA), the Middle East Water and Livelihoods Initiative (WLI) aims to improve the livelihoods of rural households and communities in seven countries, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Syria, and Yemen. These countries face severe problems from water scarcity, land degradation, water quality deterioration, food security, and public health. WLI aims to improve the livelihoods of rural households and communities in areas where water scarcity and quality deterioration, as well as land degradation, are prevalent. It primarily targets specific benchmark sites in each country that characterize the full spectrum of livelihood and watershed constraints. The sites also represent the three main agro-ecological systems in the region: irrigated, rainfed, and rangeland. Successful strategies and technologies identified through applied research and developed in the benchmark sites can thus be disseminated in the region by ‘scaling-out’ the lessons learned and the results obtained. One of the main strengths of WLI is its emphasis on the use of existing data, social capital, research linkages, partnerships, and proven methodologies and technologies in the Middle East, thereby ensuring the sustainability of the impacts achieved. The initiative promotes self-reliance by building on local knowledge and enhancing the capacity of national and regional implement-ing partners. This is done by drawing from a wide multi-disciplinary pool of expertise from ICARDA, International Water Management Institute (IWMI), six U.S. universities (Texas A&M, University of Florida, University of California at Davis and at Riverside, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and Utah State University) and three Regional universities (American University of Beirut, American University in Cairo, and the University of Jordan). Key stakeholders at the benchmark sites include National Agricultural Research and Extension Sys-tems (NARES), farmers, extensionists, and student researchers (MA and PhD levels) from the region and the United States. The WLI promotes applied research in support of solving problems in the agricultural sector in its member countries through focus on issues found on its benchmark sites in those countries. Two of these sites, one in Lebanon and the other in Syria, represent agricultural areas that are predominantly rainfed. Benchmark sites for which agricultural activity is fundamentally irri-gated are in Egypt, Iraq, and Yemen. WLI benchmark sites for which agriculture is keyed on livestock grazing in desert areas are located in Jordan and West Bank, Palestine. The work and recommendations reported here all pertain to the rainfed benchmark site in Lebanon, called Al Qaa. The site is named after the major village in the area.

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Purpose and Objectives The purpose of this study was to evaluate available data on water resources, irrigation practices, and system operation and develop a long-term plan for applied water-related research for the Orontes benchmark site. Consistent with WLI interests for the improvement of the livelihoods of rural households, this plan must focus on research that will generate returns to the agricultural sector in a sustainable way. Specific objectives of the study were to: 1. Assemble water- and irrigation-related data available from the WLI benchmark survey

work. 2. Assemble a description of water and irrigation problems as identified from the biophysical

and socioeconomic surveys conducted in the WLI benchmark site and from meetings with researchers, water managers, and irrigators in the area.

3. Identify gaps in the available water resources database that would hinder applied research

into the water and irrigation problems identified in Objective 2. 4. Develop a detailed outline of a research program in water and irrigation management that

would address water-related problems in the Orontes benchmark site, including identifica-tion of critical data gaps that would be filled, prioritization of water-related applied re-search efforts, and an evaluation of scalability of potential research findings.

Overview of The Benchmark Area in Lebanon Lebanon occupies an area of 10,452 km2, between north latitude 33°03’35’’ and 34°41’35’’ and east longitude of 35°06’22’’ and 36’50’00’’ on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. It has 73 percent of its territory as mountain terrain, formed by two mountain chains (Mount Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon) oriented from south-southwest to north-northeast. Plain territories constitute 27 percent of the country of which 14 percent constitutes the Bekaa Valley. The Bekaa Valley is the largest agricultural region of the country. The northern part of the Bekaa Valley has semi-arid and arid climates where the Orontes River (also called the Assi River) originates. The Orontes River watershed is part of the northern Bekaa Valley at the north eastern corner of Lebanon (Figures 1 and 2). The watershed extends from the northern international boarder of Lebanon into Syria toward the south of Turkey, and ultimately drains into the Mediterranean Sea. The river originates to the north of the city of Baalbeck. It flows north-northeast inside the Lebanese-Syrian border into Homs Lake (Lake Qattinah), and then to the Syrian-Turkish border before discharging to the Mediterranean. The total length of the Orontes River is 610 km, with only 40 km of this in Lebanon. The Orontes River has a maximum flow rate of about 17 m3/sec between February and April, and a minimum discharge rate of about 12 m3/sec in November and December, as measured between 1932 and 1975 at a gauge near Hermel. The transboundary basin of the Orontes River has a total area of 24,600 km2 with 69 percent located in Syria, 23 percent in Turkey, and 8 percent in Lebanon. In Lebanon, the watershed contains portions or the

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complete area of 37 municipalities. Around 250,000 persons live in the Lebanese portion of the basin, mostly distributed in 60 villages (Lehner et al., 2008).

The benchmark site of El Qaa occu-pies essentially the entire portion of the Orontes watershed that is located in Lebanon. The economy of the Bekaa Valley is predominately agricultural, and 20 percent of its approximately 100,000 inhabitants work in agriculture, with an additional 20 percent indirectly involved in agri-culture. The main crops include wheat, watermelon, apricot and almonds, with a combination of irrigated and rainfed production. Livestock produc-tion includes poultry, intensive dairy, and semi-intensive grazing of mar-ginal land by sheep and goats. Close to 400 million cubic meters (MCM) of water are generated in the Lebanese part of the upper Orontes basin. This water comes mostly from the many springs that are supplied by infiltration of rainfall and snowmelt in the Lebanon and anti-Lebanon moun-tains that border the area. Most of these springs, in particular those of Hermel and of Laboueh, have long been used for developing villages and

their orchards, as well as larger irrigated areas, with some canals dating from at least Roman times. Personnel and Procedures During this study, Ms. Roula Bachour, a PhD student in irrigation engineering at Utah State University, spent approximately two months in Lebanon evaluating available data and water and irrigation management problems in the El Qaa benchmark area. This involved several visits to the benchmark site and to various ministry and other offices, both in the Bekaa Valley and Beirut. This included meetings and discussions with numerous water management units and with farm-ers. She was assisted by Ms. Manal Al Arab, a recent MS graduate from the American University of Beirut. Ms. Bachour and Ms. Al Arab were guided in Lebanon by Dr. Musa Nemah, of the American University of Beirut. Dr. Mac McKee of Utah State University was the project PI.

Figure 1: Location of the Orontes River Watershed/Benchmark Area

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These project personnel worked in Lebanon for approximately two months to assess the availa-ble water- and irrigation-related data and identify water and irrigation management problems in the region. This involved numerous meetings with public officials, water managers, university researchers, extensionists, and farmers.

Figure 2: Areas in the Orontes Benchmark Site

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SUMMARY OF AVAILABLE DATA ON WATER AND IRRIGATION Identification and evaluation of the water- and irrigation-related data available for the El Qaa benchmark site considered both primary data that are now being collected by the ICARDA/LARI team and secondary data that have been collected by previous studies in the benchmark area or by on-going data collection efforts on the part of governmental agencies and/or NGOs. Available Secondary Data The Lebanese Agricultural Research Institute (LARI) is involved in the WLI project and has the assignment of collecting data in support of WLI information needs for the El Qaa benchmark area. In addition, LARI maintains its own on-going data collection services in the area for such things as acquisition of weather data. The LARI team has collected secondary data about the watershed, the Orontes River, and surface and groundwater in the study area for WLI. The data available from these exercises are provided in Appendix 1 of this report. By way of summary, the following is an overview of the information contained in these data: The Northern Plain of Orontes River (Agriculture homogenous zones, 2006):

Total area in the benchmark site: 38,151 hectares

Main agricultural villages: Hermel, Ras Baalbek El Sahel, Qaa

Water resources:

o Rely mainly on the Orontes (Assi) River and abtractions from groundwater. o Building the Assi Dam would irrigate 6,000 hectares. o Building the Ras Baalbek-Fakeha Dam, which will reportedly provide large

quantities of irrigation water and reduce flood risks.

Cultivated area: According to the agricultural census conducted in 1998, the cultivated area in this zone is 9,460 hectares.

Irrigated area: Approximately 6,440 hectares, mostly irrigated by artesian wells.

The Southern Plain of Orontes River (Agriculture homogenous zones, 2006)

The total area in the benchmark site: 12,117 hectares

Main agricultural villages: Laboue, Nabi Outhman, El Ain, Jaje, Fakha, Jdaydet El Fakeha, Zabboud, Jaboule

Water resources: The zone is rich in water resources, especially springs (Laboue spring

and Assi spring). Traditional irrigation techniques are predominantly used (flooding is widespread).

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Cultivated area: 4,200 hectares

Irrigated area: 2,500 hectares

Weather Data Weather data was collected from three different locations in the benchmark site (Hermel, El-Qaa, Jabboule) as shown in Appendix 4. One data set is available from the civil airport department and two from stations installed by LARI in 2009. The type of weather data available is different at each site, but generally, daily precipitation, maximum and minimum temperature, and relative humidity data are available at each site. Some sites also provide data on dew point, wind speed and direction, and/or solar radiation. Quality assurance/quality control of these (and other) data is always a potential issue. In assessing the available weather data, there appear to be some significant differences for the data from the two sources in El-Qaa even though the two stations are very close together. This indicates that reliance on these data should be done with great care. Research and statistical analyses should be conducted to standardize the weather data before it is used, for example, to estimate water demand in the area. Data on Surface and Ground Water Resources Among two hundred springs that issue within the basin, there are seven major water sources that feed the Orontes River (Table 1). Data on river flows are very limited because river gauging activities were terminated in the mid-1970s due to the conflict that happened at that time. Mean monthly discharge for the Orontes River are shown in Table 2.

Table 1: Major Springs in the Orontes River Watershed (LARI, 2010)

Springs Average discharge (m3/sec) Yammouneh 2.82 Ain Ez-Zarka 2.44 Laboue 1.60 Nabaa Tannour 1.20 Ras Baalbak 0.60 Ras El-Ain 0.35

Table 2: Average Orontes River Discharge

Monthly Mean Discharge (m3/sec) Sept Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug 12.99 12.28 11.61 11.38 11.54 12.18 13.31 14.45 15.18 15.02 14.45 13.66 There are essentially no data currently available on the location of wells and use rates of groundwater, on piezometric groundwater heads, or groundwater quality.

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Primary Data Collection Efforts by ICARDA LARI is currently conducting surveys to acquire primary data about both socio-economic data and biophysical data for the benchmark site. This is in support of WLI objectives and funded by WLI resources. The socio-economic survey is intended to acquire information about farmers and their land. In discussions with farmers and representatives of the agricultural community in the benchmark site, personnel on this project were told that farmers complained about the length of the questionnaire (34 pages, with more than 200 questions) and the amount of time it required to complete (approximately three hours per farmer). This might lead to inaccurate data and a reduced willing-ness on the part of farmers to participate in the survey and potential future WLI activities. The LARI team is also currently collecting various biophysical data in the benchmark site. This includes water samples from different wells and main canals in the benchmark area. These sam-ples are being analyzed for pH, EC, nitrate, total coliform, and E-Coli concentrations. The sam-ples are chosen randomly and are not very representative for the area. If properly sampled, the data from this study could be useful for assessing the impact on surface and groundwater of agricultural runoff, effluents discharged into the Orontes River by fish farming enterprises, and inadequate sewage management systems in the area. Similarly, soil samples are currently being collected by LARI and analyzed for texture and nutrients (e.g., P, K, Ca). All these data will be entered into a database that will be compatible with GIS maps of the area. Land cover data is also something that would be of tremendous value in understanding water- and agricultural-related problems in the study area, but LARI does not have access to satellite images of high enough geographic resolution to adequately characterize the small and highly varied land holdings that characterize the benchmark site. Water Quality and Aquaculture Research conducted by Dr. Imad Saoud from the Biology faculty at AUB (Professor of Aquaculture) is currently on-going to understand the effects of fisheries production on the water quality of the Orontes River. Commercial farming of fish has become financially attractive in the benchmark area. Most farms lie virtually on the river and discharge their pond water directly into the river without treatment. Such discharges typically contain high concentrations of nutri-ents and other types of water contaminants, and there is a concern for the impacts of this activity on the quality of the Orontes River, especially since it is essentially unregulated at present. Data and results from the study will be provided by Dr. Saoud when it is completed. Proposed and Current Water, Irrigation, and Agricultural Projects in the Area

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Numerous projects have been proposed to address water and agricultural problems in the bench-mark area. These are in various stages of planning or implementation, both in the northern and southern plains of the Orontes River. Further development of the Orontes River in Lebanon will be constrained by the agreement between Lebanon and Syria. The most significant of the proposed or on-going projects in the study area is the proposed Assi Dam that will be built on the Orontes River with a capacity of 40 MCM. This water is intended to be stored and used mostly for irrigation. According to the agreement between Lebanon and Syria, the Lebanese share of the Orontes flow is 80 MCM per year if the flow is more than 400 MCM; otherwise it will be 20 percent of the available flow. The number of wells estimated to exist in the area at the time (1995) was between 3500 and 4000. The agreement stipulates that the total flow from these wells is in addition to the above quantity. It was agreed that unused water on the Lebanese side can be stored to be used during a later irrigation season. This makes the construction of the Assi Dam a priority in order to improve to improve agricultural liveli-hoods in the benchmark area. Annex 2 presents the Lebanon-Syria agreement. In 2008, the German Technical Cooperation (GTZ) implemented a flood risk management project in the El-Qaa watershed. The objective of the project was to provide a methodological tool and source of information for the promotion and execution of soil and water conservation activities in similar environments suffering from flash floods. The plan focused on establishing water harvesting structures to reduce the runoff velocity, thus increasing the time for water to infiltrate into the soil. It also focused on specific structure types, carefully allocated to capture soil and water with minimal configuration requirements (Appendix 5: Detailed study). Among the projects in the area are: Northern Plain of the Orontes: Several water storage and/or conveyance projects are contemplated in the northern portion of the benchmark area, including:

Construction of the Assi Dam; if it is executed this project would irrigate an estimated 6,000 hectares of land

Construction of the Ras Baalbek-Fakeha Dam, which would provide large quantities of

irrigation water and reduce the risk of floods for farmers in the area

Rehabilitation of various irrigation canals Agricultural markets are nearly absent in this area, with the nearest vegetable market located at Baalbek approximately 50 km far from the region. To address this problem, proposals have been forwarded to establish packaging and refrigeration centers to store produce and provide it to the market at favorable times during the year. In addition, implementation of new crop varieties that could be competitive in foreign markets has been proposed for the area. Southern Plain of the Orontes:

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Proposed or on-going projects in this area include:

A project to establish hill lakes for water harvesting, and then use the available water for irrigation. This project is executed by USAID under the supervision of Italian engineers and technicians.

A project to build irrigation canals is being implemented by the World Bank.

A project to build a canned food factory in Jaboule.

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WATER, IRRIGATION, AND AGRICULTURAL PROBLEMS IN THE BENCHMARK AREA

A wide range of problems in the benchmark site prevent the agricultural sector from becoming more profitable. Among these are issues of water shortage and management and various difficulties with other factors of agricultural production. Cost of Agricultural Production The diversity in the topography and soil types of the benchmark area, ranging from semi-desert non-irrigated areas to fertile soils, and the presence of springs and rivers have led to crop diver-sity that encourages early, middle, and late production crops throughout the year. This is espe-cially true for vegetables in Qaa and its surrounding area, and for cherries and apricots in Aarsal. The cost of production in this region is high due to several factors, including:

Dependence almost entirely on irrigation from deep wells (100-400 meters depth)

Risk of these wells becoming dry during the summer season

High cost of tenant farming on fertile irrigated lands

High costs for the inputs to production (fertilizers, seeds, pesticides, etc.)

Unforeseen climatic factors: cold, high temperature, sudden and heavy precipitation caus-ing floods

Other Constraints in the Agricultural Sector In addition to the issues identified in the previous section, other factors were identified by local farmers that contribute to the rise in the cost of production. These include:

A lack of cadastral data for the majority of agricultural areas.

Problems related to conflict over property ownership and land fragmentation.

High groundwater costs for irrigation because water must sometimes be lifted by as much as 300 meters depth.

Farmers experience difficulty in land reclamation even though the topography of lands

consists of plains. Part of this is due to lack of funding for this purpose.

The agricultural market in the region is perceived to be largely driven by traders and sales persons who have become brokers in the local markets.

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Investors fear the risks in the agricultural sector because of the trauma that has befallen in the past generation.

The farmers sell their products in local currency (Lebanese Liras) but pay for agricultural

supplies in foreign currency. Water Rights in Lebanon In Lebanon, surface water and ground water resources are controlled by different laws and water rights. As a general convention, water cannot be owned (i.e., ownership of the resource is usufructory); it is a public commodity that no one pays for, except for the cost of operation and maintenance. Surface water resources (rivers and canals) are mainly operated by water users associations. Old, traditional water distribution systems often still depend on applying a pattern of irrigation cycles to allocate water to users, i.e., Addan allocations (getting water every 7-21 days depending on water availability, location, and irrigated area). Each water users association (WUA) has its own rates for operation and maintenance, and each decides on the share or allocation to each farmer. For example, the El Qaa Water Users Association manages both the drinking and irrigation water in El Qaa village. The association has records of the farmers and their lands, and they decide the water share of each farmer. The water delivery cycle is every 7.5, and the price is 6,000 LBP/hr. The water masters manage the water distribution from the Laboueh Canal). This canal delivers water from Laboueh (the main spring of the Orontes) to El-Qaa. It currently experiences signifi-cant water losses because of its construction (mostly earthen) and generally poor maintenance (weed removal is inadequate). These problems contribute to seepage losses and inefficient water use (see Figure 3). It is agreed that El-Qaa village has 52% of the share of this main spring, but according to the WUA, politics and other issues interfere and reduce this share each year. The concern of the WUA is to be able to improve the efficiency of this canal either by lining or conveying the flow in closed pipes, as well as building a small reservoir to collect the water and store it for use in the irrigation season. The laws governing access to groundwater are well specified, though they likely result in an economically inefficient allocation of the resource and are rarely enforced. A well of less than 150 m in depth and less than 100 m3/day simply requires a notification to the Ministry of Energy and Water. If any of these conditions is broken, a license (permit) must to be obtained which will place limitations on the well (such as a radius of influence). In the benchmark area, this law is not enforced. Following World Bank advice in 2002, Lebanon was divided into four water management regions for non-irrigation water resources: North Lebanon, Bekaa, Beirut and Mount Lebanon, and South Lebanon. In addition, the Litani River Authority was assigned the responsibility for irrigation water in the Litani River Basin and South Lebanon. Water Quantity Monitoring, Water Balance Estimation, and Water Management

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The severe scarcity of data describing both the surface and ground water resources presents seri-ous problems with regard to managing the resource. Without reliable information through time about consumptive water use rates, groundwater extraction and recharge rates, piezometric elevations, and basin in-flows and outflows, it is virtually impossible to construct a reasonable water balance estimate or to identify serious options for more efficiently man-aging the resource at the basin scale. Anecdotal information obtained from residents of the benchmark site and others who are knowledgeable of agricul-tural and water problems in the region indicate that groundwater levels at the benchmark site are drop-ping, and flows of the Orontes have been decreasing dramatically for some time, especially in the dry season. The region would benefit if farmers had new and more efficient irrigation methods. However, the extension systems at the site are poor and farm-ers lack knowledge of improved practices. More importantly, this would only address on-farm opportunities for improved water efficiency. To adequately address system-wide water issues, a basin-wide water balance must be estimated through time. The ability to do this will require on-going investments in data collection on water use rates and surface and ground water quantities (as well as qualities). These investments, along with the political will to control such problems as un-permitted groundwater abstraction, are lacking. Groundwater Groundwater has been increasingly exploited in the basin and is now apparently becoming a critical problem in some areas, in particular in the region of Qaa. Surface water/groundwater interactions are therefore a crucial issue to understand the evolution of the basin hydrology. Urban and other uses have also increased and there is a need to monitor the water balance and accounting of the upper basin. This will allow a better quantification of the resource and of its productivity.

Figure 3: Laboueh Canal delivering water to El-Qaa

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Local Irrigation Techniques The water delivered from the Laboueh Canal is mostly used for surface irrigation. This water is distributed in open channels, and farmers are afraid to shift to new irrigation techniques, such as pressurized irrigation systems, because they fear the cost of operation of pumps and filtering sta-tions. If the canal could be replaced by closed pipes, the difference in elevation could be exploited to deliver water under pressure to irrigate with more efficient pressurized irrigation systems.

Figure 4: Inefficient Irrigation of Water Melons with Groundwater, near El Qaa

For the lands that have no access to this canal, water is pumped from deep wells (85 m deep on average according to farmers in the area, with about 700 wells in the Qaa Valley) and drip irriga-tion is widely used for high-valued crops such as fruit trees and vegetables. Visits to farms in this area revealed that it is extremely uncommon for farmers to have a water meter on their pumping system or know how much they are pumping from their well. Further, farmers do not have a clear idea about crop water requirements, so irrigation scheduling is very random and water application is inefficient. Figure 4 provides an example of use of groundwater in ineffi-cient irrigation practices, as illustrated by the very wide and deep zone of wet earth and heavy weed infestation that are produced by daily irrigation with a drip system. In this case of a very

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successful farmer, pumping rates were not measured nor was attention paid to the full cost of irrigating in this fashion. Water Quality As is the case for surface and ground water quantity, monitoring of water quality conditions in the region has been limited and little is known about the water quality condition of either surface or ground water in the benchmark area. Given what is known about water pollution conditions and their causes in the Latini River, it is likely that both the urban and agricultural sectors are contributing to a degradation of the quality of the Orantes. The biophysical survey currently being conducted by LARI will shed some light on these water quality issues, but much will remain to be done in the form of monitoring and applied research to fully understand and manage the problems.

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DATA GAPS AND RECOMMENDED APPLIED RESEARCH Water is a limiting resource for the agricultural sector in the Orontes benchmark site in Lebanon. The simple examination conducted by this project of water use and agricultural production activities in the benchmark area illustrates a number of opportunities to achieve greater control over the available water resources and to more efficiently manage water in support of the improvement of regional livelihoods. Data and Knowledge Gaps Chief among the data and knowledge gaps that might be addressed through implementation of systematic data collection efforts and applied research are:

information for farmers about:

o modern irrigation techniques and the economic incentives to adopt them and manage them properly

o knowledge about crop water requirements and economically optimal scheduling of

irrigation

basic data from which a regional water balance could be periodically estimated and with which more efficient water management policies could be implemented at the system level by various WUAs and other managers, including:

o water use rates and water demand by sector, location, time, and water source o accurate weather data o land use and land cover data, especially in the agricultural sector from which

evapotranspiration rates could be estimated o economic information about the real cost of water by sector and water resource (e.g.,

surface or ground water) o surface water flows, canal diversions, and groundwater elevations o data about the number and location of wells, pumping rates, types of uses, etc. o water quality data for both surface and ground water sources

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Recommendations for Applied Research in the Water Sector On the basis of the available data and in recognition of the water management problems identi-fied, six applied research projects are recommended to address water issues in the benchmark area in particular, and the Orontes Basin generally. The nature, objectives, and potential outputs of these are described in the following sections. The projects proposed here could be defined and combined in many different ways, but the authors believe that the combination of objectives, work tasks, and expected outputs outlined in the following materials provide a good starting point for discussion of potential future WLI investments in the water problems of the agricultural sector in the Orontes benchmark site in Lebanon. Applied Research Project 1: Water Supply Assessment Introduction: Surface water (in the form of the Orontes River) and groundwater are the two available sources of water in the benchmark area, and both are limited. Average flows in the Orontes River are between 11 and 14 m3/sec. The Lebanese share of the Orontes River is 80 MCM per year if the total flow is more than 400 MCM per year; otherwise it will be 20% of the available flow. A 2002 treaty between Lebanon and Syria approved construction of a dam of 40 MCM storage capacity to store the unused Lebanese share during the rainy season to be used later in the growing season. Levels of use of groundwater are very uncertain. Estimates of the existing number of wells in the benchmark area range from 3500 to 4000. These are mostly pri-vately owned and found mainly in the Hermel caza and El-Qaa areas. Unfortunately, there are no records available regarding flows, location, drawdown, or withdrawals. Some farmers have reported that their wells are becoming dry during the irrigation season due to the inbalance between the discharge and the recharge of the aquifer. Objectives: The purpose of the study is to quantify the volume of water available during and throughout the year to provide information to support better water management and better alloca-tion of these resources among the three major sectors of water use (agriculture, industrial, and domestic). The specific objectives are to:

quantify through surface water flow measurement the amount of available water supply in time and space.

assess the drawdown in the groundwater among selected and representative wells in order

to estimate the safe-yield of the aquifer.

find potential alternative water resources, such as treated municipal wastewater, water harvested in hill lakes, etc.

evaluate options for the conjunctive management of surface and ground water.

Scope: Assessments of water supply sources involve exploring the surface water, groundwater target sites, water quality, and other unexploited water resources. Priority should be given to collecting groundwater data (pumping rates, location, drawdown, withdrawals, recharge rates,

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etc.). Following the data collection and evaluation phase, a dynamic database should be estab-lished and maintained. Research should focus on optimal allocation of these resources and their management. The possibility of future conjunctive use of these scarce resources in an optimal manner, i.e., one that maximizes the sustainable income to the agricultural sector in the bench-mark area, should be attempted. These studies will feed models that predict and forecast water supply changes. Research to develop tools to provide short-term forecasts of precipitation, daily temperatures, etc., using statistical learning machines could also be done if sufficient historical data on these variables is available. Such tools could be used to provide valuable information for short-term irrigation scheduling, for example. Expected Outputs: The outputs of this project would include:

Establishment of a functional database about the water resources of the benchmark area.

Identification and evaluation of alternatives for the optimal allocation of water among the three domains of water use as a function of demand.

Identification of alternative conjunctive use options and evaluation of their potential.

Better understanding of the interaction between groundwater and surface water resources

in the benchmark area.

Identification and evaluation of possible alternative for exploitation of available water sources in the benchmark area.

Applied Research Project 2: Irrigation Information Support Service Center Introduction: Farms in the benchmark area are of two kinds: large farms, which constitute a low percentage of the total area, and small holdings, which are the majority. In both cases, farm-ers are illiterate and farm practices are based on traditional methods and approaches and not on a modern understanding of soil-plant-atmosphere relationships. This has led to inefficient irriga-tion practices even though many farmers are using modern irrigation systems (e.g., drip). Work-shops for farmers do not solve this problem, and different types of technical help are needed. This technical help can be achieved through the design and implementation of an irrigation ser-vice center that can dynamically provide information to participating farmers. Objectives: The general goal of the service center is to provide assistance to all farmers to answer two questions:

When to irrigate How much to apply

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Specific objectives of this research are:

Construction of a database of the members’ farms of soil physical and chemical proper-ties, water, cropping pattern, and local climate.

Development of the ability to calculate on a timely basis the water need for the system

that supports the farmers and the system capacity.

Development of the ability to provide member farmers with advice on when to irrigate on the basis of basic input from the farmer on such things as soil moisture content (e.g., time since last irrigation), location, etc.

Advise farmers on selection of a new irrigation system and necessary equipment to

ensure proper operation of the system, and evaluate the efficiency of the new system.

Conduct training/outreach/demonstration efforts to disseminate the information.

Evaluation of the performance and utility of the service center concept. Scope: The scope of work would include (but should not be limited to): 1. Characterize the physical characteristics of participating farms and irrigation systems,

including: Quantification of the water-holding capacity of all soils within the domain of the ser-

vice center, and other physical properties such as infiltration rates. Acquisition of data on the location, property boundaries, and cropping pattern of each

participating farm. Acquisition on a continuous basis of all weather data and forecasts for the region. Development of a database system to easily acquire, store, retrieve, and analyze the

above information. 2. Develop and implement software to use the information in the database, together with

short-term weather forecasts, to: Quickly calculate evapotranspiration requirements of any crop in the service center area. Provide a recommendation to any farmer in the system for the next date of irrigation

and the quantity of water to be applied when given either the current soil moisture condition of the date of last irrigation.

3. Develop and implement software to use information in the database to:

Forecast water requirements for each canal for the growing season. Prepare alternatives each year for responding to climate variability in terms of irrigation

scheduling and crop selection. 4. Conduct outreach and training activity to disseminate information about access to and the

value of the information provided by the service center, including a demonstration farm and participating farmer and workshops for farmers.

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5. Evaluate and assess the effectiveness of the service center in terms of the financial returns

to participating farmers and amount of water conserved. Expected Outputs: The following outputs are expected from this applied research:

Better on-farm irrigation management, with a savings in water application.

More water conservation.

Better water productivity ($/unit of water).

Better preparation at the farm level for management for future water uncertainty. This type of center could expand in the future to supply other information of value to the farmer (e.g., soil fertility, weed and pest control, reduction of input costs, environmental protection methodologies, etc., especially in cooperation with the research centers extension agents and the in the region). The service center must operate so as to preserve the water rights for the farmer, but facilitate through the provision of better real-time information the rescheduling of the distribution of water to achieve better system-wide water use efficiency and greater profits for the farmer. Applied Research Project 3: Irrigation Efficiency and Water Management Introduction: In the benchmark area, farmers mainly employ irrigation by gravity, either flood-ing on fruit trees or furrow irrigation for vegetables. Although in new farms they have shifted to drip irrigation, most farmers lack sufficient knowledge of soil-plant-water-atmosphere relation-ships and they still adopt conventional irrigation methods that result in poor on-farm water application and distribution efficiency. Most of the conveyance infrastructure consists of unlined open channels that are poorly maintained, with high roughness leading to leakage and resulting in very low conveyance efficiency. Objectives: The purpose of this project is to conduct research that can be used to improve the overall efficiency of the irrigation scheme. The specific objectives are:

Assessment of on-farm irrigation efficiency for the existing irrigation systems.

Assessment of the conveyance efficiency of the major irrigation providers along their water delivery and distribution systems.

Economical assessment of alternatives to improve these efficiencies.

Raise awareness at all levels, from end-users and stakeholders to decision-makers, of the

economical/environmental values of water savings.

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Scope: To meet the above objectives, a study should be conducted regarding the soil-plant-water-atmosphere relationship in the benchmark area to quantify crop water requirements as a function of growth stage and water holding capacity in the root zone. This information will sup-port the development of methods to achieve better irrigation scheduling, minimize deep percola-tion, and improve on-farm application efficiency. Proper measurement of flows at different sections of the main and secondary conveyance sys-tems will quantify the quantities of water lost to leakage and deep percolation occurring along these canals. Further research and demonstration plots are needed in order to minimize all these losses and improve the overall water efficiency of the irrigation scheme. Expected Outputs: The outputs of value to livelihoods in the benchmark area are:

Water saving in order to face future water scarcity.

Possible increase of the irrigated areas or saving energy resulting from water saving.

Improve awareness on the importance of water saving at the end-users and stakeholders level.

Better understanding of the value of water creating a sustainable improved livelihood.

Applied Research Project 4: Institutional Issues in Water Management in the Benchmark Area Introduction: Water management groups in the region have limited capacity to anticipate, devise, and implement mechanisms to intercept future water problems. Groups responsible for agriculture-related research, data collection, and management are thinly staffed and have limited technical resources (e.g., LARI, water users associations). This limits the ability of extension services in the area to enable farmers to respond to water-related agricultural challenges. As a result, the cycle of problem assessment-agricultural research-extension is not as effective as it needs to be in order to help farmers respond to upcoming problems and/or opportunities, espe-cially with respect to future water availability. To sustain the livelihood of the community, proper allocation of scarce water resources must be possible in ways that will be able to address growing future uncertainties in water availability. The role of these institutions should be to address future (as well as present) water availability problems. To do this, these institutions should be strengthened so that they have the capacity to focus research results to combat growing water scarcity and uncertainty. Objectives: The purpose of the research proposed here would be to examine the need to upgrade human capital and technical resources within the institutions in the region that support or directly engage in water management. Specific objectives would be:

assessment of the capacity development needs of water management institutions in the area

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assessment of the need for expanded technical facilities (e.g., data collection, manage-ment, and analysis tools) to fully support the data collection and analysis requirements of water management in the region

assessment of the institutional arrangements that might be required to achieve greater

coordination of agricultural research and extension, especially in the water/irrigation sec-tor

design of a plan to implement sustainable institutional relationships among researchers,

extension, and water managers to improve the economic value of agriculture in the region Scope: It is important that there be a mechanism whereby the water users associations can stay updated on relevant issues with respect to new tools and methods that can be applied to achieve more efficient water use. This should include implementation of water measurement to better manage water allocations and to identify and stop water losses in the delivery system. The regional institutional research centers, such as LARI, should be in contact with water users associations and the irrigation service center (Applied Research Project 2, above) to identify problems facing end users, to search for a solution, and to deliver alternatives for better farm-level management. Water users associations should be up-to-date on work being conducted world-wide for addressing water management problems in similar climatic conditions. This should include learning about success stories and application of these lessons at the benchmark site through the water users associations. LARI should focus on research on how to save water and still optimize production. The following major task areas must be addressed in this research:

work closely with the irrigation service center on water allocation scheduling for end user members

identify the realistic range of water availability challenges that face the region, including

the possible consequences of international treaties on the Orontes and climate change

identify the need and opportunities for, and the potential economic benefits of, establish-ing closer coordination among researchers, water management organizations, and exten-sion

develop and implement a plan to expand the institutional and technical capabilities of

LARI, the water users associations, and extension, to integrate these with an irrigation service center, and to provide better and more timely information to farmers about irriga-tion scheduling, practices, and benefits

establish a monitoring and assessment program to evaluate the benefits, costs, and

sustainability of these new institutional capabilities Expected Outputs: The outputs of value to the agricultural community will be better water management at all scales (from operation of the delivery system to on-farm irrigation) and better cooperation among the water management organizations and extension agents. Ultimately, this will help close the loop of agricultural problem identification to research to extension.

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Applied Research Project 5: Aquaculture Potential and Requirements for the Benchmark Area Introduction: The Orontes River supports most of the freshwater aquaculture in Lebanon, or about 70% of all Lebanese fish farms. More than 90% of the fish species are rainbow trout with a production of 600 tons in 2002, followed by Tilapia (Lebbous and Saoud, 2006). Many fish farms are located in the Hermel area, and there is almost no control of the effluents from these enterprises. Most effluents are simply discharged directly into the main river. A study of aquaculture production and management is necessary in the benchmark area in order to sustain water quality, reduce the environmental impact of fish farming, and, at the same time, maintain the sustainability of the activity in the area. Objectives: The purpose of the study is to provide data and analyses that can be used to economically produce aquaculture in the area in order to improve local livelihoods and at the same time minimize freshwater resources pollution. The specific objectives are:

Study the possibility for diversification of fish species than can be grown economically under this ecosystem.

Assess the impacts of fisheries management in the Orontes River related to downstream

water quality.

Study alternatives to manage the effluent of each fishery to determine if this water can be used directly on-farm in order to reduce the input production cost of agriculture (i.e., reduce nitrogen application).

Scope: This project will involve the following major tasks:

Assessment of the current situation of all existing fish farms along the river, including management, disposal of effluents, production processes and rates, etc.).

Identification and evaluation of alternatives to alleviate some of the loopholes and gaps

existing along the river, and then conduct research on different fish species that can grow under local environmental conditions taking into consideration any change in temperature or other conditions important for growth that might be due to climate change.

Study the quality of the effluent water of the fisheries and integrate the nutritional content

of the effluent water into the agriculture production of the area, which might lead to a decrease in the cost of input fertilizers in the agricultural sector.

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Expected Products: The products of this research will be:

Improved likelihood of sustainability of water quality in the river.

Identification of approaches for optimizing water productivity in terms of both fish farm-ing and use of nutrients in more conventional agricultural activities.

A model to incorporate all these factors into aquaculture effluent water use for on-farm

water management.

Improved livelihoods from expanded fish production, ecotourism, and other recreational options.

Applied Research Project 6: Integrated Water Resources Management at the Basin-Scale Introduction: Piecemeal treatment of water management problems results in inefficiencies and loss of opportunities at the basin scale. This is particularly the case when water problems, and their proposed solutions, are not understood from the proper geographic, temporal, and political perspectives. Water problems express themselves across economic sectors, across alternative water sources, across disciplines, across scales, and through time. Decisions made at one scale to address issues in one water use sector can produce unwanted consequences at other scales, locations, and times. Given the magnitude of potential water storage and delivery options that are under consideration for the region, and considering the uncertainties of future water availabil-ity and climate change, it is important that a flexible and sustainable framework be established for devising, evaluating, and implementing both structural and non-structural water management options in the Orontes. This approach is often described as integrated water resources planning and management, and is most commonly applied at the basin scale. Other water research efforts previously recommended in this report will make possible the analysis of options and problems at the basin level and the identification of major directions for the long-term future of water management for the sustainable support of livelihoods in the basin. Objectives: The purpose of this research program is to establish a sustainable planning frame-work that, through time, can identify and recommend at the basin scale a sequence of water management options to implement for the continued, steady improvement of water supply condi-tions. Objectives of this research are:

establish the capacity to monitor water resources to support data needs for modeling and support of possible management decisions (see Applied Research Projects 1, 2, and 3)

implement and conduct an on-going monitoring program

describe anticipated future water problems and the full range of possible solutions for

these problems

establish measures by which solutions could be described and evaluated

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develop the modeling and information demonstration/outreach tools that would be needed to conduct periodic master planning exercises to identify then next best water manage-ment intervention

implement the capacities and tools that have been developed within the appropriate water

management institutions in the basin Scope: The principal tasks needed to establish an ability to address water problems in the Orontes at the basin scale include:

identification of present and anticipated future water problems, including availability and uncertainty of supplies

identification and characterization of the full range of structural (e.g., dams and canals)

and non-structural (e.g., alternative delivery schedules) solutions that could be made available to address future water problems (including water harvesting options). This should include location, capacity, costs, benefits, environmental consequences, etc.

development of the institutional capacity (including sustainable funding sources) to con-

duct master planning activities, including monitoring, modeling, and assessment Expected Outputs: When properly utilized, the capabilities established by this research will pro-vide earlier responses to emerging water problems, for both quantity and quality, and reduce the uncertainty that agricultural users will face in future water supplies.

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CONCLUSIONS The information gained from discussions with knowledgeable personnel and interviews with farmers, extensionists, and others in the Orontes benchmark area consistently support the follow-ing observations:

Water use in the benchmark area, especially in the agricultural sector, is inefficient. Significant economic gains to agriculture could potentially be obtained through better water management at the scales of the farm, the water storage and delivery system, and the basin.

Achieving these gains will require considerable and on-going investment in data acquisi-

tion for a wide variety of types of data. It will also require closing the loop of problem identification/ research/extension that should be in place to deliver technical advances to agricultural water users in support of improved livelihoods in the agricultural sector.

Information dissemination activities must be improved in support of agriculture, to

include the provision of economically valuable information to both irrigators and water system operators (such as has been proposed in Applied Research Project 2). Without a sufficient financial incentive, potential end-users will have no reason to support greater water use efficiency at any scale. However, such incentives should be sustainable and not simply subsidies.

The water management institutions in the region consistently lack the infrastructure and

depth of trained personnel to adequately address the information needs and knowledge gaps that farmers in the benchmark area must face. Many of the applied research projects proposed in this report are specifically intended to content with this problem, hopefully under the auspices of WLI. In the longer term, however, resources must be found within Lebanon to continue to fund the data collection, analysis, and outreach activities that are needed if an economically viable and attractive agricultural sector is to be sustainability achieved.

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REFERENCES http://waterwiki.net/index.php/Asi-Orontes http://www.icarda.org/wli/wli-partner-lebanon.html Amhaz, A., Nimah, M. & Zurayk, R. (1992) Water Resources in Lebanon: An Overview (Beirut, Lebanon,Soils, Irrigation and Mechanization Department, Faculty of Agriculture and Food Sciences,American University of Beirut) Lebanese Waters and Peace in the Middle East (Arabic). Dar Al Ilm lil Malayeen. 1997.

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Appendix 1: Secondary Data Collected by the LARI Team (unattached)

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Appendix 2: Lebanese-Syrian Agreement about Orontes (unattached)

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Appendix 3: Details about the Orontes Transboundary Agreement with Syria

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Appendix 4: Weather Data at Different Stations within the Orontes Watershed (unattached)

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Appendix 5: Flood Risk Management El Qaa Watershed 15-01-09 (unattached)

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Appendix 6: People Contacted