001/2001

January 4 2001

Editors – for further information or to interview an IWMI scientist on this topic, please contact Kshalini Nonis (k.nonis@cgiar.org)  tel + 94 1 867 404 Fax + 94 1 866854.

INDIAN FOUNDATION JOINS FORCES WITH INTERNATIONAL RESEARCH INSTITUTE TO FIND PRACTICAL SOLUTIONS TO INDIA’S WATER CRISIS

Research program taps the talent of India’s research and NGO communities to promote sustainable water management

The Indian Sir Ratan Tata’s Trust has approved a grant of US $ 1 million over five years to launch a water research and policy program that aims to help this country find viable solutions to its water crisis. The program, led by the International Water Management Institute (IWMI), will tap into the talent and existing work of Indian research institutes and non-governmental organizations. It also hopes to create a policy dialogue that will encourage a change in thinking on water issues.

India is in the throes of a major water crisis; one that it is not well prepared to face. The situation is summarized in several pieces of research recently completed by IWMI: much of western and peninsular India will suffer from acute water scarcity in the coming 25 years. Conflicts around water will intensify primarily at the local and regional level; agriculture will progressively lose its share of irrigation water to industry and municipal uses; 25% of India’s harvest will be at risk from groundwater depletion. If these problems persist water scarcity will soon emerge as a binding constraint on India’s progress.

The IWMI-Tata Water Policy Program will pool the knowledge of Indian and International Institutes to identify possible solutions and relevant courses of action. One of its main objectives is to give policy makers the scientific tools needed to avert India’s impending water crisis.  

Both partners agree that India has a large research establishment that delivers vast, high quality research in specialized fields such as hydrology and hydrogeology.  Rather than duplicating what exists, the IWMI-Tata India Water Policy Program will aim to mainstream this scientific work into a practical agenda of policy and action. It will communicate the results effectively to policy makers, NGOs and the public to catalyze action. As  Mr. Ratan Tata, Chairman of the Tata Trust, emphasizes: “The IWMI-Tata Program will focus on problem solving research by identifying and promoting sustainable water management practices that are based on good science.”

The Tata grant will be used to collaborate with 60-80 Indian research institutions and grass roots NGOs doing action and policy research. Initially, the IWMI-Tata Program will put a particular focus on groundwater depletion and contamination, a problem that is already reaching crisis proportions in western and peninsular India. India has some 20 million private tubewells; and this number is increasing by some 1 million every year. Some 35-40% of India’s electricity and fossil fuel consumption is devoted to pumping groundwater mostly for irrigation. IWMI feels that reform of the groundwater sector is critical to India’s environment as well as agrarian economy. The IWMI-Tata Program will, to start with, focus much of its energy on achieving sustainability in the country's groundwater use. 

IWMI’s recent work in India has a strong policy focus. In Eastern India, the Institute has worked with International Development Enterprises, an international NGO, to study the mass promotion and marketing of low-cost treadle pump technology for manual irrigation – which promises to improve smallholder household incomes by $1 billion US dollars annually, when its full potential is realized.

In Western India, IWMI has been working with NGOs, like PRADAN and Tarun Bharat Sangh, and community organizations to assess the role that indigenous water harvesting and groundwater recharge activities can play in fighting water scarcity. More recently, senior IWMI staff helped UNICEF and the Gujarat-based Institute of Rural Management at Anand to develop a White Paper for the Government of Gujarat in semi-arid western India that outlines practical strategies for fighting recurrent drought.