IPTRID's beginning

In 1988 discussions among several international organisations focused on the challenge facing many developing countries dependent on irrigated agriculture, namely increase food production for the expanding populations. However, irrigation and drainage systems were often in need of modernization to improve productivity and make better use of existing but limited water supplies. Moreover, there was an impellent need for technology research so that these countries could take full advantage of new, modern techniques which have significantly transformed agriculture in Europe, USA and elsewhere. In order to achieve these objectives, it was of paramount importance to focus international attention on these issues.

IPTRID resulted from these discussions. At the request of the International Commission on Irrigation and Drainage (ICID), and in close cooperation with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the World Bank mobilized the donor community, particularly France, Germany, Netherlands and UK. In 1990 a Secretariat of four professionals was set up within the World Bank office in Washington, D.C. IPTRID's role was to work as a broker, bringing together research needs with funding agencies and research contractors.

Success with R&D

Between 1990 and 1997 the Secretariat succeeded in raising the awareness of the importance of Research and Development in irrigation. Although IPTRID is not a reasearch institute itself, it helped developing countries to establish national research priorities in the irrigation sector and then located appropriate research funding.

Over this first phase of IPTRID activity, major focuses of R&D projects were: modernization of irrigation systems, sustainable land and water use, widespread of mainteinance technology.

The success of the programme was demonstrated by the fact that during this period it identified more than 90 research projects, resulting in 34 project proposals for financial support that raised over US$55 million for research programmes and projects in irrigation and drainage. Most of these activities were components of larger World Bank projects.

From Washington to Rome

In July 1998 the IPTRID Secretariat moved to the headquarters of the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) in Rome. In addition to the availability of FAO's wide and considerable expertise in agriculture, water management and development, IPTRID started benefit from FAO legal status and logistic support.

This new favourable condition allowed IPTRID widening the scope of its core programme beyond the role of research broker to address technology transfer and capacity building, to support national research in irrigation and drainage and to provide up to date knowledge for researchers and practitioners in the front line.

IPTRID today

Between July 2002 and July 2003, IPTRID Secretariat in close consultation with donors and members of the Network has reformulated its programme, approved in September 2003 by the Consultative Group and Management Committee. The new challenge of IPTRID is to cooperate with governments and institutions in assessing Capacity Development needs and in formulating sustainable agriculture water management strategies and facilitate funding and implementation of capacity development programmes and projects focused on technology transfer and update of research results. This new policy has been desxribed in details in IPTRID Partnership Programme 2003 - 2005.

Present thematic focus

	Smallholder Irrigation
	Water conservation
	Drainage and sustainability
	Modernization of irrigation

Products

Since its inception IPTRID has produced a number of outputs:

	R&D Programmes: Identification and Formulation was the early work of IPTRID in brokering R&D needs with appropriate funding and research contractors.
	Capacity Development in the agricultural water management sector includes all activities aiming help professionals do research more effectively, improve the knowledge of the national front line staff, as well as improve farmers capacities through trainings, demonstrations, extension and information services, etc.
	Issue Papers are prepared to draw the attention of the specialised workers in the various disciplines as well as policy makers to important issues affecting agricultural rural development.
	Knowledge Synthesis introduced the idea of distilling existing and new knowledge to make it more easily available to researchers and practitioners in irrigation. Too much of the world’s irrigation knowledge is locked up in unpublished reports or ‘lost’ because of the short ‘corporate memory’ of organisations. Synthesising knowledge not only makes this information available in a digestible form but it also helps to avoid people repeating research that has already been done elsewhere.
	Networking enables both irrigation researchers and practitioners to gain access to quality information. Its Central Network comprised its principal partners, namely HR Wallingford (UK), Bureau of Reclamation (USA), CEMAGREF (France), ICID Central Office (India), ILRI (The Netherlands), FAO (Italy), IWMI (Sri Lanka) and CIHEAM Bari (Italy). To complement this Country Networks were set up in 14 countries to provide an important interface between individual users, local languages, local organisations and the Central Network services. The advent of Internet became a powerful tool in this dissemination process. It was however recognised that many beneficiaries still did not have access to the Internet nor was their first language of choice English or French. So, traditional paper-based approaches remained equally important.
	Project Identification, Formulation and Implementation Based on earlier identified R&D needs and partly based on projects suggested by national governmental agencies, several projects were identified and formulated to various degrees of detail. They are being submitted to donors for financing.
	Miscellaneous Progress reports, consultancies, concept notes, etc.

Achievements

During the last five years, activities have been undertaken all over the World: projects, conferences, workshops, missions, etc. where organized in a large number of countries.
- Sub–Saharan Africa: Burkina Faso, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Senegal, South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe.
- Asia and Pacific: Cambodia, China, India, Laos, Malaysia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Uzbekistan, Vietnam.
- Mediterranean area: Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey.
- America: Mexico and Cuba.