Slipping on targets

At a time when agricultural production needs a boost, and especially in the context of a potential shortage globally of foodgrains, it is a tragedy that the irrigation sector continues to suffer from neglect even though it has been included in the government's flagship Bharat Nirman programme. With the first two years of the 4-year programme having gone by, only about 60 per cent of the target of bringing an additional 10 million hectares under assured irrigation (an 11 per cent addition to the existing total) is likely to be met. Against the target of creating fresh irrigation potential of 4.3 million hectares in the first two years, the actual achievement has been only 2.5 million hectares. The Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Programme (AIBP), based on the well-conceived strategy of facilitating speedy last-mile completion of existing irrigation projects, has also begun flagging. In fact, going by the meagre allocation of funds and tardy progress so far, there is every danger of the lags widening further. The government has till now sanctioned only 40 per cent of the Rs 8,580 crore sought by the water resources ministry for this purpose, and it is hard to see how the slippage can be made up within the original time frame. Under the accelerated programme, too, the allocation recommended by the Planning Commission has been only Rs 2,700 crore, far short of Rs 5,000 crore demanded by the ministry. It is not clear whether the problem is shortage of funds, or whether the low financial sanctions are a reflection of inadequate project preparation. Whatever the case, the original targets are now unreachable.

The bigger crime perhaps is to create the irrigation facilities and to then fail to do the necessary works that will take water to the farms. The painful fact is that a sizeable part of the expenditure on irrigation is virtually dead investment, as only a part of the created potential is being gainfully used, and even that is often in a manner that proves counter-productive because it causes water-logging and soil salinity. On paper, the country's total irrigation potential that has been exploited stands at a healthy 90 million hectares, but no more than around 55 million hectares (about 40 per cent of the net cultivated area) actually receive the benefits from this investment. As such, a large part of the country's total exploitable irrigation potential, reckoned at 140 million hectares, remains untapped. What this boils down to is that nearly 60 per cent the country's farmland remains dependent on uncertain rainfall.

Everyone knows that the most important input for the farmer is water. By not meeting the targets for creating irrigation facilities, the country is letting go of the easiest opportunity to boost farm production. It is worth recalling that much of the growth in agricultural output in the past was accounted for by the expansion of irrigation facilities. It is a pity, therefore, that when agriculture needs another push similar to the one it got at the time of the Green Revolution, irrigation is not getting the attention its desperately needs.