Abstract
This paper examines irrigation management within the Tunisian Water Users Association (WUA),in Nadhour public irrigated area (central of Tunisia). The functioning of 14 WUAs was evaluated based on questionnaires and related interviews. The methodology of this study consists of two main steps; (i) an estimation of technical efficiency scores of 90 smallholder farmers and the sub-vector of WUE (Water Use efficiency) using the non-parametric DEA model, (ii) a regression of a Tobit model to test the hypothesis regarding explanatory variables of differentiated technical efficiency scores. The investigation shows an average technical efficiency of 70.8% and WUE of 64.8%. It highlighted the Water turn, the infrastructure state, the water supply shortage, corruption, and free-riding behaviors as tightly correlated factors with farm’s productivity. This suggests that there is potential to improve production efficiency by implementing targeted programs and rules for inefficient farmers. The findings of this study show that it is important to fight corruption in the water sector by an increased government oversight, reform of regulations, and increased accountability
Highlights
Growing water scarcity in many countries has put pressure on irrigation systems, as the main consumptive user, to release water for other uses and improve performance (Malano et al, 2004)
The measurements of technical efficiency estimated using the Data Envelopment Analysis approach (DEA) approach are presented in Table 4 along with frequency distribution
The estimated mean of input-oriented technical efficiency under the CRS assumption for the sample of irrigating farms was 70.8%. This implies that the sample irrigating farms could reduce their inputs by 29.2% on average given the current state of technology and unchanged outputs
Summary
Growing water scarcity in many countries has put pressure on irrigation systems, as the main consumptive user, to release water for other uses and improve performance (Malano et al, 2004). Often shortages due to a lack of water resources but to governance failures, such as institutional fragmentation, lack of coordinated decision-making, corruption, and deficiency of transparency and accountability, resulting in a shortage of access to water. Governance systems are rarely able to prevent corruption which provides incentives for unethical or even illegal behavior. The Tunisian government has undertaken massive reforms to address rural poverty and inequalities. It has adopted ambitious new water legislation that promotes equity, sustainability, representativity, and efficiency by decen-
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