Organizational Change for Participatory Irrigation Management

2. REPUBLIC OF CHINA
INTRODUCTION
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Ming-Daw Su
Professor
Department of Agricultural Engineering
National Taiwan University
Taipei
The origin of participatory irrigation practices in Taiwan can be traced back to hundreds
year ago since the Ching-Dynasty. Some famous historical irrigation canals in Taiwan were
named after its constructor. Farmers gather their own money and land for their own irrigation
needs. Canals and ponds were constructed by the farmers themselves for food production.
Organization was also formed by the farmers for management of these irrigation facilities.
Nevertheless, there were events of water diversion conflicts among different farmer groups at
the upstream and downstream. Today, irrigation associations formed by the farmers are the
basic irrigation management institution in Taiwan.
PARTICIPATORY IRRIGATION MANAGEMENT: PRESENT STATUS
There are now 17 irrigation associations in Taiwan with comprehensive irrigation
network and facilities, their own staff, and budget. Some irrigation associations even own
reservoirs. The irrigation association collects membership fees from its members and supply
water to their farms for irrigation needs. The associations build and maintain their waterdistributing
infrastructure and manage irrigation with their own personnel as private sectors.
The membership fee is collected on area basis. The president of the association is elected by
the farmers and is responsible for all the administration and the management of the association.
A legislative body consisting of councilors is also elected by the farmers. This council
supervises the operations of the association. In order to be eligible for election, the candidates
for the president and the councilors should hold membership of the association. The collection
of membership fee has been discontinued since 1990. The government subsidizes this financial
deficiency by its annual budget. This change increases the government subsidy to the irrigation
operations (Table 1 and Figure 1).
The organization chart of a typical irrigation association is shown in Figure 2. There is
a chief engineer and a general manager under the president of the association. The Engineering
Division does all the engineering work to keep the irrigation system functioning. Such work
includes designs, constructions and maintenance of distribution canal system and related control
structures. The management division is responsible for the irrigation planning, scheduling,
operation and management. The Financial Division handles the budget, accounting, and
manages the properties of the association.
The command area is divided into workstations, each with an average area of 2,000 ha.
A workstation is then subdivided into 10-15 working groups. The working group is the basic
operational unit of the irrigation association. The staff delivers water to the check gate of the