economics of on-farm development - Institute for Social and ...

eturns per unit area and ensures water use efficiency In irrigation systems 2
(Reddy. 1998).
Theoretically. the complementarity hypothesis may hold good as long as
the development <strong>of</strong> irrigation leads to changes in cropping pattern from low
value inferior varieties to high value superior varieties <strong>of</strong> grain or commercial
crops. with an assured and sustainable increase In income to the beneficiary
farmers. It would then automatically lead to a rise in factor use intensity and
output expansIOn (Dhawan. 1998a; 1999b: Winpenny. 1997). An antithetical
situation would emerge, if the changes are not on the expected lines. This
implies. as already mentioned. that mere development <strong>of</strong> physical infrastructure
for providing irrigation water need not or may not automatically increase
effectiye demand for water and corroborate with farm
level secondary
imestments on OFD related structures to protect land from adverse effects in the
long run and to improve water use efficiency.
The agricultural development experience <strong>of</strong> Kerala needs to be examined
in terms <strong>of</strong> this antithetical process as discussed above. Because, in spite <strong>of</strong> the
strong infrastructure base for irrigation development, the utilisation <strong>of</strong> the
potential already created has not been very encouraging. This aspect <strong>of</strong> the
problem is critically reviewed in chapter 2 and empirically verified in the
subsequent chapters. The increasing under-utilisation <strong>of</strong> irrigation potential in the
completed irrigation projects and less or no potential to meet the effective
demand in a majority <strong>of</strong> the on-f!oing irrigation schemes in the: state need to be
explained in nn nntitheticnl framcwork <strong>of</strong> irrigntion development (Chnrt 3.2).
I A detailed discussion on the beneficial effed <strong>of</strong> OFD on farm output and water use
efficiency in irrigation commands is given in Chapter 2.
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