Below the Radar: Data, Narratives and the Politics of Irrigation in Sub-Saharan Africa
Below the Radar: Data, Narratives and the Politics of Irrigation in Sub-Saharan Africa
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2021
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通讯作者：
J. Venot;Sam Bowers;D. Brockington
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作者：
J. Venot;Sam Bowers;D. Brockington
新出现的叙述呼吁承认并建设性地与小规模农民接触，他们在塑造撒哈拉以南非洲目前的灌溉动态方面发挥着主导作用。本文探讨了新的灌溉数据是否可以有效地告知这些叙述。报告认为，由于各种原因，撒哈拉以南非洲的官方灌溉数据未能反映灌溉的全部范围和多样性及其在过去二十年中的快速分布增长。本文调查了利用遥感方法生成灌溉数据的最新趋势，并探讨了相关的期望，即这些技术能够更好地了解当前的灌溉发展和小规模农户的作用。它报告了一项试点研究，该研究利用基于雷达的图像和分析，为坦桑尼亚三个地区的水稻灌溉农业的范围提供了新的见解。我们进一步强调，这样的测绘工作仍然植根于一个二元逻辑，将“灌溉”从其他“非灌溉”景观功能。它们可能源于并加强了对灌溉的传统理解，这种理解仍然受到工程设计和农业现代化的殖民遗产的影响。由于农民的倡议质疑这种灌溉的主导观点，并且在由水资源短缺的叙述主导的政策背景下，这意味着新数据可能会提高小规模灌溉者用水的可见性，但可能会让-菲利普·韦诺和萨姆·鲍尔斯是联合第一作者。一般性意见和其他信函应送交Jean-Philippe Venot。有关遥感雷达分析的信函应寄给Sam Bowers。水替代品- 2021年第14卷|第2期Venot等人：撒哈拉以南非洲地区的灌溉数据政治也使他们更容易受到有利于更强大的用水者的限制。因此，本文件呼吁摆脱关于灌溉数据和监测的狭隘辩论，而转向全面讨论撒哈拉以南非洲灌溉发展的性质。这种讨论对于支持建设性地参与农民主导的灌溉发展是必要的;它也具有挑战性，因为它涉及到面对根深蒂固的既得利益，并要求改变发展做法。
Emerging narratives call for recognising and engaging constructively with small-scale farmers who have a leading role in shaping the current irrigation dynamics in sub-Saharan Africa. This paper explores whether new irrigation data can usefully inform these narratives. It argues that, for a variety of reasons, official irrigation data in sub-Saharan Africa fail to capture the full extent and diverse nature of irrigation and its rapid distributed growth over the last two decades. The paper investigates recent trends in the use of remote sensing methods to generate irrigation data; it examines the associated expectation that these techniques enable a better understanding of current irrigation developments and small-scale farmers’ roles. It reports on a pilot study that uses radar-based imagery and analysis to provide new insights into the extent of rice irrigated agriculture in three regions of Tanzania. We further stress that such mapping exercises remain grounded in a binary logic that separates 'irrigation' from other 'non-irrigated' landscape features. They can stem from, and reinforce, a conventional understanding of irrigation that is still influenced by colonial legacies of engineering design and agricultural modernisation. As farmers’ initiatives question this dominant view of irrigation, and in a policy context that is dominated by narratives of water scarcity, this means that new data may improve the visibility of water use by small-scale irrigators but may † Jean-Philippe Venot and Sam Bowers are joint first authors. General comments and other correspondence should be addressed to Jean-Philippe Venot. Correspondence on remote sensing radar analysis should be addressed to Sam Bowers. Water Alternatives – 2021 Volume 14 | Issue 2 Venot et al.: The politics of irrigation data in Sub-Saharan Africa 547 also leave them more exposed to restrictions favouring more powerful water users. The paper thus calls for moving away from a narrow debate on irrigation data and monitoring, and towards a holistic discussion of the nature of irrigation development in sub-Saharan Africa. This discussion is necessary to support a constructive engagement with farmer-led irrigation development; it is also challenging in that it involves facing entrenched vested interests and requires changes in development practices.