Master of Engineering in Environmental Water Resources Engineering and Management

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Browsing Master of Engineering in Environmental Water Resources Engineering and Management by Subject "CIVIL ENGINEERING-THESIS"

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    item: Thesis-Abstract
    An Evaluation of the status of integrated water resources management (IWRM) in the Kelani river basin of Sri Lanka
    Wijesundera, SP; Wijesekera, NTS
    Increasingly countries world over are experiencing difficulties in accessing safe sources of water for all their consumptive purposes in wake of rapid population growth and environmental degradation. Consequently, there is increased competition for this scarce resource. In this backdrop, Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) is fast emerging as a legitimate alternate management model to previously sect orally fragmented management practices to better utilize the available resource more prudently and to ensure its long-term sustenance. IWRM is defined as "a process which promotes the coordinated development and management of water, land and related resources in order to maximize the resultant economic and social welfare in an equitable manner without compromising the sustainability of vital ecosystems". This in essence requires a fundamental paradigm shift in the management and governance of water./ The Kelani River Basin of Sri Lanka which hosts its capital city and has the largest basin population is one of the most important basins in the country. The basin experiences many problems related to its water resources of which most are attributed to weaknesses in management that is divided along sect oral lines. /Additionally, the country's policies and laws are outdated and fragmented, making their implementation difficult. Given this situation, a rethink on water management and its governance has become and issue of primary importance.\ The research objective is to evaluate the application of the principles of IWRM in Kelani River Basin to identify where the current management practices departs from the stated principles and its affect on water resources of the basin; and propose improvements for water management./ The research was conducted by means of a desk study and a basin wide field survey. /The desk study consist the review of current literature on IWRM, study reports conducted on the development of the Kelang River Basin and other academic publications on IWRM. The field survey consisted, a survey of General Stakeholders in sixty locations, consultations with ten Institutional Stakeholders, of which seven were state institutors and three independent It was evident that if not managed properly water resources in Kelani will be under severe stress in the near future, particularly during the dry seasons. Considerable pollution of water is seen with rapidly increasing population and the removal of forest cover degrading the watersheds./ In the context of IWRM practice in the Kelani River Basin, the study rates the current implementation status as a "Low" at 1.41 of 5.0; or 28.2%. The key water sector institutions believe that this rate needs to be at 3.71 of 5.0; or 74.2%; for water management in an IWRM context be considered as effective and thus be rated as "Substantial". The study reveals that there is informal, fragmented and unplanned implementation of IWRM in the Kelani basin and that this level of intervention is inadequate to ensure the sustainable use of water, both within or outside an IWRM context. /Therefore, it can be argued that an overarching water policy framework together with the necessary institutions geared towards integration in management and empowerment of the community, underpinned by sound economics and equity criteria; are necessary mainstays for the long run sustainable utilization of water resources in the Kelani River Basin
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    Evaluation of operational performance in Rajangana major irrigation sche
    De Alwis, SMDLK
    Managing the resources in a major irrigation scheme needs more attention on system performance to get the optimum production out of the available resources. In Sri Lanka, most of the major irrigation schemes are managed with conventional management strategies along with the traditional experiences gained by both farmers and officers. Some instances, systematic observation of resource use and management are not adhered by the scheme managers as well as by the farmers. This situation has effected to low productivity of the schemes. Providing adequate effort for integration of inter-related activities and combining the physical, biological and human factors on productivity is not so easy task in the irrigated agriculture sector. Therefore assessing the issues and constraints and evaluating the scheme performance in a systematic way enhance the managers to take prompt action when required while delivering the services in operational procedures./ In view of developing a suitable performance assessment programmed for a major irrigation scheme a study was done on performance assessment under water use efficiency, irrigation practices and land productivity in the LB Tract 01 area of Rajangana Irrigation Scheme. This study included turnout area basis assessment with the collection of data and information through literature review and field surveys along with the statistics collected from related institutions and departments. Study was carried out to evaluate the performances of Irrigation system through performance indicators by using systematic observations, documentation and interpretation methods. Several assumptions were made during the analysis with regards to data that were out of reach or inaccessible. Data and information used were from year 1990 Yale season to Year 2002 Yale season. The Rajangana Major Irrigation Scheme is one of the Major Irrigation Schemes in dry zone of Sri Lanka and it is considered as a water abundant scheme following the restoration of Kalawewa under the system "H" of Mahaweli Development Program. Rajangana reservoir provides irrigation water to 5520 ha of lands under gravity irrigation system and 1602 ha of lands under the lift irrigation system. At present there are about 6275 ha of lands under gravity irrigation system and area under the lift irrigation system has reduced to 1050 ha mostly due to other constraints of lift irrigation system such as irrigable land being utilized for homestead purposes and abandoning of some lands as a result of inadequate operation and maintenance of pump houses. This scheme has been divided in to 25 tracts to provide irrigation facilities. Out of these 7 tracts belong to the LB irrigation system and 18 tracts belong to the RB irrigation system. It appears that the productivity of the scheme does not show a good performance in utilization of water & land when compared with yield and income of the farmers and as a result the living standard of the settlers too does not indicate as satisfactory./ This study examined the cultivation patterns of past seasons, irrigation water use by the farmers, production cost, farmer incomes, cost of operation and cost of maintenance of the system. In this study the command area under the Tract 01 of LB system was selected as a pilot area because similar variations were observed in other tracts during preliminary surveys. Outputs of the study are expected to be generalized to whole scheme./ Performance of the irrigation system depends on a large number of variables. In this study 11 performance indicators assessed the system performance in four main areas via, service delivery, agriculture production, agriculture economics & financing an system sustenance. Spatial and temporal variation of water deliveries were found ire terms of adequacy and irrigation duty. Water use efficiency measured in terms old grain mass per unit volume of water reflects that the water use efficiency of the study area is far below the established benchmark value of 0.372Kg/m3. Stud)M revealed that the irrigation system of the study area is subjected to deterioration due to inadequate attention on operation and maintenance. The efficiency of getting potential yield in the area is 68% with medium level productivity performance. Recommendations of this study would be useful to managers who deal with major irrigation system management in planning the cultivation seasons by optimizing the productivity of land and water.