ROLE OF WATER USERS COOPERATIVES IN OPERATION AND MAINTENANCE OF SOUFI CHAI IRRIGATION AND DRAINAGE NETWORK

Management of Irrigation and Drainage Networks (IDN) by government in the past few decades has not resulted in optimal operation and maintenance and the irrigation efficiencies are far below the design bases. Failing to collect the water fees has been another incentive for the East Azerbaijan Regional Water Authority (EARWA) to think of the beneficiaries as the main custodians of the network both in design and implementation stages of Soufi Chai IDN and this was in accordance with the traditional network operation management in the region. Therefore, for the first time in the country, 17 Water Users Cooperatives (WUC) were formed in 1994 within the framework of Note-26/ Budget Act of the same year and cooperatives were allowed to participate in the implementation of the network. the consulting engineers considered the opinions and rights of the beneficiaries in design. The implementation of the Alavian Storage ended in 1999. For a short while, EARWA operated the system, then holding a tender, the operation and maintenance management was conferred on a contractor. As a part of the network management, WUC annually makes contracts with the contractor for the delivery of volume- based irrigation water to be distributed among users. WUC participates in operation and maintenance management of Grade-1&2 Canals, collects the water fees from the members, has remarkable part in settling the disputes and sociopolitical issues. EARWA is trying to build the union of water user’scooperatives to confer on them the operation and maintenance management of the whole IDN downstream Alavian Storage Dam.

کلیدواژه ها:

EARWA ، IDN ، WUC