CHALLANGES AND FUTURE NEEDS FOR IRRIGATION MANAGEMENT IN INDONESIA

Sigit Supadmo Arif 1 and Murtiningrum 2

ABSTRACT
Irrigation can be viewed as a system with several subsystems which interact to its surroundings.
Therefore changes from its environments may affect to irrigation system which requires adjustment
in irrigation management. Human resources and instituion arrangements, food needs, infrastructure
deterioration, and environment degradation challenge the irrigation management in Indonesia. In
order to respond to the challenges, future needs include institution strengthtening, infrastructure
development and rehabilitation, economic and financial policy, and irrigation-related reseaches.

INTRODUCTION
Water is an essential element for agriculture because water is used by crops for photosynthesis,
nutrition transport, transporation, and so on which in turn make crops produce biomass for human
need. Water is also used for creating favorable condition for land preparation. In Indonesia, which
lays in a tropical monsoon region, rainfall is the main water source for agriculture. However, rainfall
varies spatially and temporarily so that it sometimes cannot fulfill crop water requirement at the
optimal time. Irrigation supply crop water requirement among variation of rainfall.
In irrigation management, it is necessary to consider the specific characteristics of water resources.
Water resource is a finite reources as the number of water in the world remain the same. Because of
hydrologic cycle, water is considered as quasy renewable. Water is also a vulnerable resources
because it is affected by its surrounding including its users. Therefore the abstraction of water for
irrigation should take these characteristics into account.
Besides for irrigation, water is required for many different purposes, functions and services. Holistic
management, therefore, has to involve consideration of the demands placed on the resources and
the threats to it. Holistic management involves the management of natural systems as well as
human activities which create the demands for water, determine land uses and generate water
borne waste products. In more and more complex life nowadays and in the future, irrigation
management as part of water management is getting more challenging. This paper aims to reveal
problems confronted in the future followed by alternatives to deal with them.
MAIN COMPONENTS OF IRRIGATION MANAGEMENT
An irrigation system is defined as human intervention to modify water resource spatially and
temporary therefore all or a part of it can support crop growth and improve agricultural production
(Small and Svensend, 1992). The definition implies that in irrigation human is an important factors in
managing natural resources especially water. The Government Regulation No. 20/2006 on Irrigation
explicitly stated that human resources is a part of irrigation system besides infrastructure, water,
management, and institution of irrigation management (Anonimous, 2006).
The purpose of irrigation management is to provide the best service for farmers to achieve optimum
production. Irrigation management is a process in which water resources is allocated and utilized
sustainabli and effectively in term of budget (Malano and van Hofwegen, 1999). Irrigation
management can be focused on on three elements, namely water, physical structures, and social

1
2

Profesor, Department of Agriculture Engineering, Faculty of Agricultural Technology

Lecture, Department of Agriculture Engineering, Faculty of Agricultural Technology

organization. (Uphoff, 1986). The three irrigation elements interact to each other so that it is more
simple to analysis each components followed by their interactions
of the history of irrigation in Indonesia (van Setten van Meer, 1976 and Lombard, 1996) shows that
irrigation is an important aspect of food supply although it is located in the tropical monsoon region
with a lot of rain. Because it affects the livelihood of many people, irrigation has been a tool to
strengthten the government political power. At some point, irrigation has became a critical aspect to
determine the development of agricultural country (Arif, et al, 2010).
Basically, the irrigation management consist of five elements, namely infrastructure, human
resources and institutional, legal basic, financial and economic, and the environment (Burton, 2010).
To deal with future challenge of irrigation management, recent performance of each component
should be known and current constraints should be analyzed.
Although there are some different among experts in categorizing irrigation elements, there is a
similarity agreed that irrigation consists of multi elements. The elements interact to each other
results in overall irrigation performance. The change or disturbance to one element of irrigation
system may effect to other elements furthermore this result in the change of irrigation system as a
whole.

CHALLENGES OF IRRIGATION MANAGEMENT IN INDONESIA

This part reveals the challenges of irrigation management in Indonesia in the future. The
explanations are arranged according to the component of irrigation systems.
Multi-Institution
In the past, Indonesian irrigation development and management has always focused on the
construction of irrigation infrastructure. However, the only successful infrastructure development
without human development as the basis for community participation and development institutions
may result in the unsustainability of irrigation system. Therefore, both Law No. 7 / 2004 on Water
Resources and the Government Regulation No. 20/2006 on Irrigation requires participatory in the
implementation of development and management of natural resources and irrigation.
Although institution is considered as essential element and the central issue in irrigation
management, policy of national irrigation institution development is absent. In the Government
Regulation No. 20/2006 on Irrigation said that the asset management of irrigation consists of
irrigation infrastructure and supporting assets. Both of the assets in the form of institutional support
and human sumbardaya nirwijud is an asset. Policies on infrastructure asset management as a form
of assets could have done but kebiujakan about nirwujud asset management has not been done.
Currently irrigation development and management held by many institutions. At the national level
task performed by at least five ministries, namely: The Ministry of National Development Planning
(BAPENAS), The Ministry of Public Works (PU), The Ministry of Agriculture, The Ministry of Internal
Affair, and The Ministry of Finance. Among those five ministries, none of them is designated as a
leading sector, which coordinate all irrigation activities in Indonesia. The absence of the leading
institution may leads on the lack of responsible institutions so that it will be difficult to determine
the source of inappropriateness when it occurred. This was worsen by the absence of dialog forum
to discuss about programs as well as to share any information to support to each other
performances.
In provincial and district levels, multi-institution has also taken place together with problem of
unavailability of dialog forum. In addition, form of provincial and district offices which responsible to
irrigation management are different among areas. This followed by various scopes of works,
authority, and responsibility which may result in different performace of irrigation management.

Human Resources
Some facts said that human resources is the weakest point in irrigation management recently.
Althouth it is stated in the Government Regulation No. 20/2006, policy regarding human resource
development and management is absent.
Human resources is characterized by its numbers, distribution, education, and competency. Most of
human resources in irrigarion management are civil servants and some others are non-permanent
workers in field levels. Problem of human resources is related to retirement of many field staffs
without proper recruitment recently. Moreover the new staffs receive inadequate trainings to do
their daily jobs. In district levels, the local government sometimes rearrange the local staffs among
departments without considering education and work experiences. This resulted in incompatibility
between staff competencies and job requirements.
Food Requirement
Food is a basic requirement for every human to survive therefore fulfilling the food requirement
become attention of the government. Indonesia is a big country with more than 237 million people
(BPS, 2010) to be feed. The population number is increasing by 1,52% per year. Besides number of
population, The food requirement depends also on job opportunity as measurement of access to
food.
The problem of fulfilling food requirement is the fact that food requirement increase faster than
food availability. The food requirement increase as a resulted of population increase, economic
growth, and dietary change.
Food consist of food and drink from crops, livestocks, and fish both primary product and processed
food. Food requirement is then stated by energy (kcal/capita/day) and protein (gr/capita/day). The
minimum food requirement is 2500 kcal/capita/day and 55 gr/capita/day for energy and protein
respectively (Suryana, 2005). Both sources of energy and protein in Indonesia are generally from rice
as shown in Table 1. Although during the last 15 years, there has been a dietary change, Table 1
shows that rice has become the majority food source. Rice supplied more than 50% of energy and
more than 40% of protein. Therefore, the irrigation management is more focussed on rice
cultivation.
Table 1. Share in Dietary Energy and Protein Consumption

Energy
- Rice
- Corn
- Wheat
- Sugar
- Cassava
- Others
Protein
- Rice
- Wheat
- Pelagic fish
- Groundnut

1990 - 1992

1995 - 1997

2000 - 2002

2005 2007

54
7
5
5
5

52
7
5
5
5

52
7
5
5
5

50
9
6
6
6

48
7
7
5

41
7
7
5

41
7
7
5

40
7
7
5

Infrastructure Deterioration
The issue of infrastructure is very important, because it is difficult to manage irrigation well without
good infrastructure. In the past, the irrigation development focused only on infrastructure
development. Infrastructure development which was done based on of modernization theory with
top-down method and disregard the participatory approach give very few benefits to the
community, especially farmers as main beneficiary. Top-down developed system resulted in some
poor characteristics of irrigation system. First, the government is very dominant in policy
formulation and implementation. Second, the government controlled the technology so that
transfer of technology and knowledge was limited. Third, role of technology and local knowledge
were decreasing. Last, irrigation management was considered only as input of food production
systems as anticipatipon of climatic anomaly.
At present the total area of irrigation system in Indonesia amounted to 7,469,796 ha or 33,210
systems consist of 2,851,006 ha (241 systems) of central government authority, 1,423,222 ha (1,109
systems) of provincial government authority, and 3,195,568 ha (31,860 systems) of district
government authority (Ministry of Public Works, 2010). These figures show that most of irrigation
systems in Indonesia are small systems with less-than-1000-ha areas under district government
authority. Problems arise from these systems may be location specific, however some of them may
be difficult to solve. Numbers of command area of small irrigation systems show that the district
government has a strategic role in the development of local management. The greater attention
given to the development and management of irrigation, the greater the contribution of irrigation at
the national level. Therefore, it is important for the district government to pay the attention to the
performance of irrigation in each region.
In wider irrigation systems as ones under central government and provincial government authorities
problems arisen are different. Issues such as infrastructure deterioration will have impact on the
other components of irrigation management with greater scale and chain effect. Damage of a part of
dam will result on social problem, institutional commitment offense, conflict, and eventually
unsustainability.
Table 2 provides data on condition of irrigation infrastructures in Indonesia. The data shows that
performance of existing irrigation infrastructure condition is unsatisfatory. It is required a lot of
financing for major rehabilitation as well as operation and maintenance of existing irrigation
systems. The financial issues of irrigation systems become a major problem ini some places
especially after local autonomy policy. The problems were especially related to the authority and
ability to finance as well as the relationship among authority levels in term of financial
responsibilities.
Table 2. Detailed Irrigation System in Indonesia 2010
No.
1.

Authority

Area (ha)

Number of
System
244

Good
1,455,115

349

219,665

68,647

203,247

65,219

3,338

214,563

87,542

88,908

51,874

Central
2,682,897.8
government
2.
Provincial
556,780.30
governments
3.
Dictrict
442,888.62
government
Source: Ministry of Public Works, 2010

Condition
Fair
Poor
342,131
752,180

Ruined
113,467

Some large systems, for instance Jatiluhur System, has already over its lifetime. This type of
irrigation system need to be reconstructed with new criteria because its strategic and ecological
environment has already been changed. Since several years ago, some countries have developed
and implemented the concept of modernization of irrigation. In Indonesia, the concept of

modernization of irrigation is now formulated by an expert team. Although Indonesia has had some
experiences, it is difficult to decide how to implement it.
Environment Degradation
In Indonesia, the population growth by the 1,52% annually in the last decade. The population growth
may result in the increase of land requirement for housing and industries consequently this also
cause the high rate of land conversion. High economic development also caused the conversion of
irrigated agricultural land to other use.
Other environment issue which has impact in irrigation is watershed deterioration. Only a few
irrigation systems in Indonesia served by reservoirs to supply water. Most of irrigation systems
depend their water supply on dam on river. Therefore, water supply is highly depend on watershed
condition. The problem is critical watershed is increasing day to day which result in fluctuation of
river discharge and may reduce water availability for irrigation.
Global Warming
El Nino and La Nina events were shown by SOI value (Southern Oscillation Index). El Nino events
were shown by large negative SOI which brings dry years, while La Nina events were correlated with
positive SOI which related to wet years. The frequency of El Nino has tended to increase from once
per 8 years during 1876-1976 to once per 4 years during 1877-2000 as shown in Table 3 (Irawan,
2002). The extreme negative SOI, which resulted in drastic decrease of rainfall, particularly occurs in
March, April, June, July, September, and October (Irawan, 2003). This pattern gave a disadvantage
for Indonesian agriculture, because September/October is planting time and March/April is the
maturing period for wet season farming, which contributes more than 60% of yearly production of
food crops.
Table 3. El Nino and La Nina events by 25 year interval in 1876-2000
El Nino Events
La Nina Events
3 events
3 events
(1877, 1888, 1896)
(1879, 1880, 1886)
1902 1926
4 events
3 events
(1905, 1912, 1914, 1919)
(1910, 1916, 1917)
1927 1951
2 events
2 events
(1940, 1941)
(1938, 1950)
1952 1976
2 events
6 events
(1965, 1972)
(1955, 1956, 1971, 1973, 1974,
1975)
1977 2000
9 events
3 events
(1977, 1982, 1983, 1987, 1991,
(1988, 1989, 1999)
1992, 1993, 1994, 1997)
Source: Irawan, 2000
Period
1877 1901

The El Nino events of in 1982 and 1997 are the biggest ones in history. The 1997 El Nino caused a
decreased of rainfall as much as -30.8% and -62.2% for wet and dry seasons respectively. In 1982,
rainfall decreased -17.3% and -44.0% for wet and dry seasons respectively (Irawan, 2002). During
those two El Nino, Java and Sulawesi sufferred more decrease of rainfall compared to the average
over all provinces. Since Java and South Sulawesi are major food producers, El Nino events could
disturb national food security. The 1997 El Nino resulted in a decrease of water storage of about
33% at the Jatiluhur Reservoir and about 30% at the Rentang Reservoir in West Java. Decrease of

water debit also occurred in reservoirs in Central Java of between 5% and 60% in 20 observed
reservoirs.
The decrease of the food crops harvested area caused by El Nino was estimated at about 1.25
million ha (-8.6%) and 1.18 million (-6.4%) in 1982 and 1997, respectively (Irawan, 2002). El Nino,
which causes decreased rainfall, stimulated farmers to harvest their food crops earlier to avoid
harvest failure from water insufficiency. This reflected the farmers response in facing climate
uncertainty. This strategy, however, resulted in lower yield and poor quality.

FUTURE NEED
Strengthtening Institution
Strengthtening irrigation management institution is the main requirement because from good
management came from robust institution. The strengthening institution in the future needs :
1. Establish an institution that can act as a leading sub-sector so that the performance of
irrigation in both the national and regional level can be maintained because of a
coordination between actors
2. Establish a sharing job and responsibilities among institutions in all levels
3. Establish a forum among institutions of irrigation management in every level and among
levels
4. Prepare the guidelines and procedures for the implementation of minimum service and
irrigation audits
5. Develop the guidelines for monitoring and evaluation (M&E) for development and
management of irrigation in national level and convert it to be applied in district and
provincial levels
6. Develop a database of irrigation development and management
7. Utilize the evaluation results to improve of managerial development and management of
national irrigation.
Human Resources Development
The importance of human resources is obvious because human is the center of managament. Many
people involve in the irrigation management, ranged from farmers, field staffs, office staffs, to highrank officials in ministery offices. To ensure that all parties can carry out the duties and obligations, it
is necessary to apply participatory approach. Generally, the need for human resources development
can be chategorized as:
1. Develop the concept and implementation of the principle of human capital to grow
individual learners and organization learners based on information source of knowledge and
decision making
2. Revitalize the training and empowerment units for farmers and bureaucracy to broadcast
knowledge
3. Develop the participatory method in accordance with the socio-cultural communities
Infrastructure Development and Rehabilitation
Possibility to broaden irrigated land is restricted by limited land availability besides the funding
limitation. Most of available land sized less than 3000 ha. Some irrigation systems, which are beyond
their technical age, need major rehabilitation, upgrading, and modernization. These processes are
not only to restore the infrastructure but also develop the management function as a service to the
farming community. Furtheremore, irrigation infrastructure will resurge as more effective and
efficient systems to serve as provision irrigation management.
Irrigation infrastructure development and rehabilitation in the future needs:
1. Develop a map of potential areas for new irrigation system development

2. Conduct dialogs among institutions on accelerated development of new irrigation system

3. Change of mindset that rehabilitation, upgrade, and modernization of irrigation systems are
efforts to improve provision-based irrigation management
4. Perform new construction, major rehabilitation, upgrade and modernization participatorily
and gradually in accordance to funding ability and people need.
Operation and Maintenance of Irrigation System
Operation and maintenance activities are now receive limited attention in irrigation management.
Attention in O&M is mainly paid to technical and financial aspects while institutional aspect is often
neglected. Therefore an O&M paradox arised that everyone said that O&M is important but it is
neglected so that built-neglect-rebuilt attitude is occured. Therefore, the main O&M issue is to
develop O&M attitude by developing O&M institution whic is strong technically, financially, and
institutionally.
Considering the O&M issue, in the future the O&M development need :
1. Strentghten institution of O&M to develop the O&M culture
2. Improve the capacity of O&M staffs as well as fulfill their work requirements
3. Provide incentives and disincentives for O&M staffs
4. Provide forum of sharing knowledge and experiences as well as documentation of the
learning process
5. Develop an O&M manual for each irrigation system which is flexible to anticipate climate
change and other changes
6. Provide O&M fund based on actual O&M requirements
7. Develop a shared database among institutions to support the O&M activities
8. Develop an information system based decision support for O&M activities.
Economic and Financial Arrangement
Increasing complex problems of irrigation development and management leads to the increase of
the irrigation financing problem. So far, irrigation management depend only on the government
budget therefore it is now necessary do consider other funding sources especially from beneficiaries
and users of irrigation assets. Irrigation financing policies may need:
1. Establish legal basis for irrigation financing policy from several source of income especially
from the users and beneficiaries
2. Conduct financial planning periodically
3. Evaluate the completed irrigation financing schemes
4. Develop the documentation process of the implementation of grands and loans for future
lesson learn.
Research
In Indonesia, research on irrigation has been conducted independently by may institutions.
Documentation of completed research and dialog among researchers are important to avoid reinventing the wheel.
1. Develop a documentation of outcomes of irrigation-related researches conducted by all
institutions
2. Conduct cooperation researches among research institutions and users
3. Organize dialog between researchers and users to determine relevant research topics.

CONCLUSION

Irrigation as a system consists of several sub systems which interacts to each other. From time to
time, the of strategic environment of irrigation system has been changed which may result in the
change of the systems. Therefore, a set of policies and actions are needed to anticipate the changes.
Issues of irrigation management can be chategorized as human resources and instituion
arrangements, food requirements, infrastructure deterioration, environment degradation, and
global warming. In order to respond to the challenges, future needs include institution
strengthtening, infrastructure development and rehabilitation, economic and financial policy, and
irrigation-related reseaches.

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