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FYI: FAO LAND AND WATER ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER



Apologies for cross-postings/lle

Forwarding Land and Water Newsletter of FAO for your interest.
Tanveer Arif

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FOOD AND AGRICULTURE ORGANIZATION OF THE UNITED NATIONS (FAO)

LAND AND WATER ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER

Number 13 7 August 1997

The Land-and-Water-l electronic newsletter is a free service
aimed to provide up-to-date details on the activities of the FAO
Land and Water Development Division. It would be appreciated if
subscribers could forward the newsletter to colleagues in related
fields for their information. To subscribe, send an E-mail to
MailServ@mailserv.fao.org, leave the subject blank and then put
in the first line of the message the following :
Subscribe land-and-water-l

Contents

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1./ Soil Fertility Initiative (English)

2./ Water Report 10: Quality control of wastewater for irrigated
agriculture (English)

3./ Three Internet services for the irrigation world (English)

4./ Drainage des Terres Irriguees (Francais) - El Drenaje de las
Tierras de Regadio (Espanol)

SOIL FERTILITY RECAPITALIZATION WORKSHOP IN LOME, TOGO, April
1997

The  IFDC (International Fertilizer Development Center) and the
World Bank organized a workshop on the "Development of National
Strategies for Soil Fertility

Recapitalization in Sub-Saharan Africa"  in Lome, Togo, 22-25
April 1997.

The Workshop's Secretary, Burkina Faso's General Secretary of the
Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Resources Martin Bikienga
said: "This workshop will inspire governments and farmers to meet
the challenge of managing the soils with care to prevent their
impoverishment.  In the long run soil fertility recapitalization
will receive high priority in the agricultural policies of our
countries, and emphasis will be given to create the
socio-economic environment conducive to such an effort". Funded
by the Netherlands Environmental Trust Fund, the workshop
attracted 120 delegates  representing government and donor
agencies, the private sector, farmer organizations, subregional
institutions, and national and international research centres
located in 22 sub-Saharan and six industrialized countries.

Results of the workshop included a consensus on the strategic
role of soil fertility recapitalization as a basic condition for
agricultural growth,

Rural development, and the protection of the environment in
sub-Saharan Africa and a strategic framework for national action
plans for soil fertility recapitalization.  This workshop
represents an outgrowth of the 1996 World Food Summit conducted
by FAO, which called for a renewed global commitment to solve the
problem of chronic food insecurity and urged governments and
international institutions to strive to achieve lasting fertility
improvements in tropical soils.  A group of international
institutions and the World Bank have joined forces to work with
governments to develop and implement national action plans to
reverse the trend of declining soil fertility in sub-Saharan
Africa within the framework of the Soil Fertility Initiative
(SFI).

The synthesis included the consensus that the delegates reached
concerning the main constraints to soil fertility improvement and
possible solutions.  Identified constraints revealed a shift from
the almost exclusive attention to technical, agro-ecological
factors limiting agricultural production to policy measures and
socio-economic conditions that limit farmers' access to resources
and means of production.

Four building blocks should be included in all national action
plans for soil fertility improvement.  These building blocks
include geographic characteristics, macro-economic data with
linkages to soil fertility improvement, agricultural policies
such as pricing and land tenure situation, agricultural
constraints and possible solutions.

The Director of IFDC-Africa sees a clear message emanating from
the workshop., "Technical and financial support is available
within the framework of the SFI," Breman says,  "Therefore,
interested countries are encouraged to structure and express
their demand by elaborating national action plans".

Mr. Bikienga articulates well the interest of sub-Saharan
countries in the Soil Fertility Initiative.  "The SFI responds to
a need created by the combination of soils that have a very low
inherent fertility, inappropriate cropping practices, rural
poverty and unfavourable climatic conditions.  Through the SFI,
donors, international institutions, and governments will be able
to work with farmers to ensure food security, alleviate poverty,
conserve the natural resources, and develop a production base for
present and future generations." Issuing a challenge to other
countries of the region, Mr. Bikienga urges,

"All countries in sub-Saharan Africa must believe in the SFI and
mobilize their resources to avail themselves of this opportunity.
They should apply themselves to developing national soil
fertility management strategies to present to donors.  These
strategies should be aimed at the sustainability of efforts and
investments involved and therefore be extended over a period of
20 years and beyond".

More information about this workshop and the Soil Fertility
Initiative can be obtained from Jan.Poulisse@fao.org

WATER REPORT 10: Quality control of wastewater for irrigated crop
production

This document discusses the use of wastewater for irrigated crop
production. It reviews wastewater standards and proposes an
interim approach to be applied in areas using wastewater, which
promotes safe production areas for crops such as vegetables.

The approach is to assess the quality of water actually used for
irrigation against a known standard. It is proposed that the
World Health Organization guidelines for wastewater treatment
plant design be used as irrigation water standards in making this
assessment. In view of the fact that the present level of water
contamination in many countries already seriously exceeds the
limits set in the guidelines, achieving the prescribed standards
for vegetable production would be a major accomplishment towards
improving health conditions in these countries.

The document makes reference to procedures developed and studied
in 1992 in an FAO project in Chile. Comments and suggestions for
improvement of this approach for practical application in the
field are invited and encouraged.

Water Report No 10: "Quality control of wastewater for irrigated
crop production", ISBN 92-5-103994-1, price 10.00US$, can be
purchased from the Sales and Marketing Group, FAO, by E-mail
(publications-sales@fao.org) or online through FAO's interactive
Publications Catalogue (Http://www.fao.org/catalog/giphome.htm).

More technical information can be obtained from
Fernando.Chanduvi@fao.org

THREE INTERNET SERVICES SERVING THE IRRIGATION WORLD:

The tremendous growth of the Internet, spreading all over the
world, has opened up vast possibilities of fast and
cost-effective ways of exchanging data and information over long
distances. The Department of Rural Engineering of the University
of Kassel has established three major services to assist the
irrigation world in finding the information needed and to provide
a worldwide platform for professional discussion and information
exchange. The three services are:

(1.)"The WWW Virtual Library IRRIGATION",

(2.)"IRRISOFT - Database on IRRIGATION & HYDROLOGY Software" and

(3.)"IRRIGATION-L" an e-mail discussion list.

-=-=-=-

(1.) The World Wide Web Virtual Library IRRIGATION

The Virtual Library Irrigation provides links and information to
servers and sites holding knowledge relevant to irrigation and
hydrology on the web. The on-line library includes information on
discussion lists, news, listings of water experts, irrigation
systems, statistics, hydraulic engineering, standards,
management, hydraulic modelling, hydrology software, irrigation
drainage, salinity, agronomy, drought management, soil water
relationships and much more. It might serve as a starting point
for professionals searching for irrigation related information.
The URL of the Virtual Library IRRIGATION is:
http://www.wiz.uni-kassel.de/kww/irrig_i.html

(2.) IRRISOFT - WWW Database on IRRIGATION & HYDROLOGY Software

The user-friendly World Wide Web has revolutionized the handling
of information and has created an ideal platform for the
implementation of Internet databases. The IRRISOFT Database is a
comprehensive list of software descriptions and links to the
corresponding sites and persons holding additional information on
the software described. In some cases download facilities have
been included to facilitate the software retrieval. Links to
other related servers and sources of information have been
included. At the moment there are more than 100 programs with
detailed program descriptions listed. The URL of IRRISOFT is:
http://www.wiz.uni-kassel.de/kww/irrisoft_i.html

(3.) IRRIGATION-L (E-mail Discussion List)

IRRIGATION-L is a e-mail discussion list on all kinds of topics
related to irrigation. It allows a broad international audience
to participate in discussions and to exchange information. It is
not only intended to cover purely technical aspects of irrigation
like design, hydraulics, system layouts etc. but it is also open
for topics like irrigation management, socio-cultural, political
and economic questions which are steadily gaining importance. All
discussions are archived and current discussions are added
continuously. Results may be viewed shortly after the posting has
taken place. Powerful search facilities have been implemented
allowing to search the entire IRRIGATION-L archives. Additional
information on subscription and all the archived mails are found
on the IRRIGATION-L Home Page under the URL:
http://www.wiz.uni-kassel.de/kww/irrigation-l_i.html

For any questions concerning these three services please contact
Thomas-M. Stein at the following E-mail adress:
stein@wiz.uni-kassel.de

DRAINAGE DES TERRES IRRIGUEES

Drainage des terres irriguees est la neuvieme publication d'une
serie de manuels de formation en irrigation. Ce manuel traite des
besoins de drainage dans les zones irriguees, particulierement au
niveau des exploitations agricoles. Il examine les systemes
permettant de drainer les terres irriguees et analyse les
facteurs pedologiques et hydrologiques qui determinent le
drainage. il aborde brievement les questions de conception, de
construction, de fonctionnement et de gestion des reseaux de
drainage de parcelles.

Gestion des eaux en irrigation, Manuel de formation 9: "Drainage
des Terres irriguees", 75 pages. ISBN 92-5-203779-9, Prix
10.00$E.U. Renseignements et commandes:
Publications-sales@fao.org ou par le catalogue interactif de
publications de la FAO (http://www.fao.org/catalog/giphome.htm)

Si vous desirez plus d'information technique, envoyez un mel a
Fernando.Chanduvi@fao.org ou Julian.Beltran@fao.org

EL DRENAJE DE LAS TIERRAS DE REGADIO

Drenaje de las terras de regadio es el noveno de una serie de
manuales sobre el riego. En el se examina la necesidad de drenaje
en las tierras de regadio, centrando la atencion en el drenaje a
nivel de explotacion agricola. Se analizan tambien los sistemas
utilizados para el drenaje de tierras de regadio. Se exponen
brevemente los temas relativos al trazado, la realizacion, el
funcionamiento y mantenimiento de los sistemas de drenaje.

Manejo del agua de riego, manual de campo 9: "El Drenaje de las
Tierras de Regadio", ISBN 92-5-303779-2 , precio US$ 10.00, puede
ser adquirido del Grupo de Ventas y Mercadeo, FAO, por correo
electronico (publications-sales@fao.org) o a traves de la linea
inter-activa del Catalogo de Publicaciones de la FAO
(Http://www.fao.org/catalog/giphome.htm). Tambien esti disponible
en Ingles y Frances.

Contact: Fernando.Chanduvi@fao.org o Julian.Beltran@fao.org

FAO's LAND AND WATER DEVELOPMENT DIVISION ON THE INTERNET

Our URL:
Http://www.fao.org/waicent/faoinfo/agricult/agl/aglhomep.htm

For new subscribers, the first issues of the Land-and-Water-l
electronic bulletins have been placed on the Web. They are
available at the following URL:
Http://www.fao.org/waicent/faoinfo/agricult/agl/lwissues.htm

Our E-mail adress: Land-and-water@fao.org

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Linda L. Elswick
Director
Washington Office
World Sustainable Agriculture Association, 2025 I Street, NW#512, WDC, 20006
Phone: 202-293-2155
Fax: 202-293-2209
Email: wsaadc@igc.apc.org
Web Site:  http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/wsaa

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