THE NECESSITY OF FARMERS PARTICIPATION IN CONSTRUCTION OF PRESSURIZED IRRIGATION SYSTEMS FOR PIM SUSTAINABILITY IN IRAN

As a developing country, Iran has several large-scale irrigation and drainage networks under study and operation. These networks are often constructed in small-scale farmlands, and because of water deficit, inappropriate topography and incentive policies, they are equipped with pressurized irrigation systems in which operation is more complicated, comparing with surface irrigation method. On the other hand, government policy is to develop private sector and therefore transferring operation of the networks to farmers organizations is highly considered. Regarding considerable costs of project execution which is provided by public credits also bank facilities by farmers commitment establishing a sustainable PIM is highly important. Nowadays, national policy is often accelerating construction in large-scale pressurized irrigation projects, as a result all components of pressurized irrigation systems being performed by government, so farmers do not play such an important role in this process. This theorem would cause some problems in transferring the irrigation system management to farmers organization. In the present paper, the results obtained from performing under pressurized irrigation systems by government is compared with the one constructed by farmers organization, also offers some suggestions with regard to changing the present procedures and participating farmers organizations in project execution.