Viet Nam has about 100 large- and medium-scale irrigation and drainage schemes. One of the oldest and largest, the 60-year-old Bac Hung Hai (BHH) system, is in the heart of the Red River Delta and services the provinces of Bac Ninh, Hung Yen, and Hai Duong. The BHH irrigates and drains 192,045 hectares (ha) of land, of which 76% is used for agriculture, mainly for paddy rice cultivation, but also increasingly to produce high value fruit tree and vegetable crops. However, as at project appraisal, the availability of water for agricultural production was threatened by increasing water demand due to high population growth and rapid industrialization and urbanization, effective water resources management needed to be put in place.
Against this backdrop, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) approved a $100 million loan for the Strengthening Water Management and Irrigation Systems Rehabilitation Project in April 2010. The project was designed to support one of the major objectives of the government’s five-year socioeconomic development plan, 2006–2010: to accelerate agricultural and rural industrialization and modernization through the promotion of large-scale agriculture commodity production. It aimed to contribute to increased agricultural productivity in the BHH area, as impact; and strengthen the quality of water-related services provided by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD), as outcome.
At appraisal, the project had four planned outputs: (i) increased human resource capacity for sustainable water management, including providing the Water Resources University (WRU) new facilities, (ii) increased capacity of BHH irrigation and drainage infrastructure, (iii) strengthened institutional capacity of water-related service providers in the BHH irrigation and drainage system, and (iv) operational project management. It was co-financed by the Agence Française de Développement on a parallel, collaborative basis.
The project substantially attained its planned outputs, albeit with some delays and underachievement in the gender-related target of ensuring 50% participation by women in water user groups (WUGs), which was difficult as most of the WUGs in the pilot area were already established prior to subproject implementation. Construction of a new WRU campus was completed in 2016, triggering increases in bachelor-of-science and master-of-science enrollments. The ten constructed and/or rehabilitated pumping stations more than doubled the BHH irrigation capacity and tripled its drainage capacity by 2017, compared with their 2009 levels. By project completion, they were providing irrigation to 11,200 ha and drainage for 49,000 ha, as intended.
Participatory irrigation management (PIM) planning, implementation, and management systems were established in the PIM pilot district in Bac Ninh province. Participation of WUGs in the design and implementation of on-farm subprojects was ensured and all participating WUGs received PIM training. Operation and maintenance (O&M) guidelines were prepared and implemented for all project-supported subprojects, with provincial people’s committee’s allocating adequate O&M funds for the completed infrastructure. In addition to providing irrigation management companies with irrigation and drainage technical training, the project successfully launched the supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system, which was originally planned for piloting in Bac Ninh only but was expanded to all BHH schemes, and in 2018, was being installed in other irrigation schemes including in the Mekong Delta.
Adequate project management and implementation support was provided, notwithstanding the eleven-month delay in mobilizing a dedicated consultant. Comprehensive project implementation guidelines were prepared, and all counterpart staff received timely and adequate trainings on ADB project and financial management procedures.
Substantial output deliveries enabled the project to achieve its intended outcome. On a scale of 1 to 4, water delivery services to farmers in the BHH irrigation and drainage system improved from an average value of 1.6 in 2009 to 2.6 in 2016, against a target of 2.5. Facility improvements eased fieldwork and enabled the farmers to have better control of water supply for paddy rice and vegetable crops. Other positive project results include the prevention of damage to residential areas that make up as much as 30% of all the lands within the pumping station service areas; and improved inland water transport, since the new SCADA system allows real time monitoring of water level at the major structures and sluices, permitting barges and boats to pass through the BHH system’s larger canals with fewer delays.
The project consequently succeeded in achieving its envisaged impact. Productivity and crop intensity targets were substantially achieved, respectively by 2017 and 2015, well ahead of the 2020 target-schedule. Broader impacts on inclusive growth and sustainable development have also materialized. The livelihoods of farmers, who are among the poorer segments of the population in the project areas and the most vulnerable to poverty and climate change impacts, have improved with better irrigation and drainage. Their increasing shift to higher value crops has enabled them to attain higher and more stable incomes, improving their day-to-day lives as well as adaptive capacity to climate change impacts.
MARD was the project executing agency. Its central project office implemented the project through a central project management unit and provincial project management units.
