Results
Only the main results are presented in the table below. Many more activities are happening at country level.
Topic | Date | Results |
Water Accounting (WA) | ||
Crop Mapping | 2019 | A detailed land use and crop map using remote sensing was prepared for Jenin site for one cropping season, with the aim to assess better crop water consumption. |
2019 | Three Palestinian experts were trained on the realization of crop maps using remote sensing and the use of the FAO WaPOR database. | |
2019 | A team of 10 Palestinian experts were trained on the use of remote sensing and GIS for natural resources by FAO experts. | |
2020 | A crop map was developed for the winter season crop mapping. | |
| 2021 | A crop mapping for the spring season conducted A crop map was developed for the spring season |
| 2022 | A crop map report and flyer were drafted |
ET measurement | 2019 | Two Palestinian experts were trained on the fabrication and installation of the ET Cordova station. |
2021 | Three Palestinians were trained in Cairo with ICARDA under the ET-NETWOK project | |
| 2022 | Six Palestinians were trained on ET-CORDOVA assembling, functioning and installation in Jenin Two ET-CORDOVA stations were installed in Jenin governorate Third ET-CORDOVA station is under procurement |
Piloting Water Accounting WA | 2019 – 2020 | A case study on Rapid Water Accounting (RWA) was realized on al Moqatta’ area in Jenin analyzing the realities of water scarcity and uncertainties. A poster/flyer describing the RWA of Al Moqatta’ has been prepared. |
2021 | A flyer on RWA has been developed. A draft final report on “filling the gaps and reduce uncertainty” prepared by the WA expert A draft policy brief on water accounting was prepared with IHE | |
| 2022 | Final report on “filling the gaps and reduce uncertainty” prepared Final report on WA is under preparation A draft report on RWA for Al Fara’a catchment is prepared A report on WGA for Al Fara’a catchment is under preparation |
Training on WA and Auditing | 2019 | Three national experts have been trained to become analysts on advanced WA and auditing in a regional training implemented by FAO with IHE-Delft, and IWMI-MENA. |
2019 – 2020 | Twenty national and sub-national experts have been trained on the water accounting assessment process covering RWA and different WA frameworks. A series of trainings were implemented at local level and through virtual webinars. Seven national experts trained on MODFLOW modelling. | |
2021 | A series of trainings were implemented through virtual webinars (NEXUS and Remote sensing) A training course on water management and governance was hold A training on CB4WA is ongoing with OCW IHE Delft A number of training conducted on drafting policy briefs A series of webinars on ET estimation through remote sensing A video on WA was developed with the support of IHE-Delft A national virtual workshop on “Water Governance in Al Fara’a catchment” held on Thursday 8 July 2021. The workshop targets participants from relevant governmental organizations, NGOs, Farmers Organizations and FAO. Expected outcomes are framing Key problem, key drivers of change, and gaps to fill in. 28 participants from different institutions were attended the workshop The second national workshop on water accounting “filling the gaps and reducing the uncertainty in the Eocene Basin” held on November 3d. The workshop targets participants from relevant governmental organizations, NGOs, municipalities, academia and FAO. Expected outcomes are identifying uncertainties and gaps to fill in. 28 participants from different institutions were attended the workshop
Meetings with IHE-Delft is ongoing to support the drafting of the Final WA report | |
2022 | An FAO international consultant was in a mission in Palestine conduct field work on mapping stakeholders with the WGA of Al Fara’a study The second national workshop on “Water Governance in Al Fara’a catchment” was held on March 15th. The workshop targets farmers, well owners, village councils, NGOS participants from relevant governmental organizations, NGOs, in addition to MoA, PWA and FAO. 35 participants from different institutions were attended the workshop. A webinar was convened on April on the “filling the gaps and reducing uncertainties in the Eocene basin” as the second round of water accounting A team of 3 Palestinians experts were trained in Alexandrea on water accounting and 5 Palestinians participated in the regional water accounting and Governance workshop A national workshop on water accounting was conducted on June 15, with around 55 participants, including minster of Water Authority, deputy minister of the Ministry of Agriculture and the Head of the FAO mission in Palestine. | |
Water Productivity (WP) | ||
WP assessment | 2018 | Three experts were trained on the concepts and methodologies of WP. |
2019 | Four experts shared their water productivity experience at the regional water productivity conference, and successfully joined the WP community of practice. | |
2019 – 2020 | A nation-wide WP baseline and the field level WP assessment with a detailed farmer survey on practices versus water. A national dialogue was carried out to discuss the findings. | |
2020-2021 | A series of trainings were implemented at local level and through virtual webinars Continuous work on FFS (on job training for FFS members) and providing farmers with agricultural materials and equipment helping them in reducing water consumption and other inputs | |
2021 | A series of virtual webinars on WP were hold A kick-off meeting on “piloting in-situ water harvesting techniques in rainfed olive trees orchards in three sites; two in Tubas and one in Jenin governorates” was held by July 14th. The work on piloting water harvesting on olive horticulture started and locations were selected and field work started Construction of WH micro-techniques were started in two localities A kick-off meeting with ICARDA and ARIJ was held for coordinating the WH activities Joint sub-activities between ARIJ and ICARDA started. The study on the biophysical and economical date palm and olive trees started and field work continued on December. Seven Palestinians were trained in Amman with ICARDA on the installation of soil moisture sensing equipment, monitoring procedures and data interpretation and WH design and implementation. | |
2022 | Construction of micro- water harvesting techniques were started in the third locality by ARIJ. Sixty farmers were trained on good agricultural practices on olive farming in Palestine. Soil moisture’s sensors were installed in the WH pilots. Intensity rain gauges were installed in the WH pilots. Two web stories on the training courses developed. Final report on “biophysical and economical WP on date palm and olive trees” was drafted. Six Palestinians were trained on the Aqua Crop model for water management during April that conducted by ACSAD. Two Palestinian experts present results of biophysical and economical water productivity on avocado, date palm and olive trees through the WP talks webinar series. | |
WP at field site: Farmer experimentation | 2018 - 2020 | Five Farmer Field Schools (FFS) were established with the support of the extension service of the Ministry of Agriculture. Schools were set in five villages in three main areas: Jenin, Tubas and Salfeet. FFS groups worked on good agricultural practices for improved water use for different crops including two for cucumber, tomatoes, olive trees, and snake cucumber. An average of 20 - 25 farmers were present in each school and one experimental plot is available per school. |
2020 | A Training of Trainers on FFS methodology was carried out by FAO and the Jordanian MoA facilitators in Jordan for 20 Palestinian extension agents. A web story on snake cucumber farming in Salfeet was published. | |
2021 | Three Farmer Field Schools (FFS) were established with the support of the extension service of the Ministry of Agriculture. Schools were set in three localities in three main areas: Qalqilya and Tulkarm. FFS groups worked on good agricultural practices for improved water use for different crops including two for Avocado, and one for colored peppers. Other two FFSs on seedless grapes and pumpkin are still ongoing. A story on avocado farming in Qalqilya was developed. One FFS on grafted cucumber established in Qabatya, the pumpkin women FFS in Jalameh continued for second season and the supplementary irrigation for olive FFS in Aqqaba continued for the second season. Agricultural materials were distributed for beneficiary farmers in all FFS. Three Palestinians experts were trained in Egypt on Farmers Business Schools. | |
2022 | Six FFS on Avocado, seedless grapes, colored pepper, cucumber and pumpkin are ongoing in different regions in the northern West. Four Farmers Business Schools were established. A workshop presenting the avocado FFS results was conducted in Qalqilya with around 35 farmers on 5 June. | |
Findings from Water Accounting in Moqatta’:
There are water that is imported from Mekorot for municipal water supply. A part of the municipal wastewater water, either treated or untreated, is flowing to Israel crossing the green line and causing charge to Palestine for wastewater treatment. There is an opportunity to use such wastewater by reusing it for agriculture, although it requires a cost-benefit analysis, stakeholder engagement to maximize the wastewater reuse, and impact assessment in relation to change of access to water among various stakeholders.
It is highly possible that some communities are not receiving sufficient household water supply, at least in Jenin area. The limiting factor on quantifying the deficit is the unknown rate of non-revenue water. As the technology is developing in flow metering, it may become possible in near-future that leak detection and reduction may become more feasible, leaving opportunities for investment.
It seems monitoring of agricultural water consumption by traditional method (using irrigated areas based on agricultural statistics and using crop water requirement as surrogate for crop water consumption) may not work well. Use of remote sensing (RS) for both crop mapping to capture the irrigated area (in contrast with the statistics) and for evapotranspiration (in contrast with use of crop water requirements) may become a more suitable approach. However, RS products require calibration and validation data collected on the ground. Investment is needed on capacity to use RS appropriately.
Findings from the Water Productivity Farmer Survey and Baseline Study:
Farmers' Survey
A semi-structured survey was conducted on a sample of 35 farmers. A wide diversity of crops, from horticultural (cucumber and potato) to forage crops and olive trees was found, with the majority of farmers being reluctant to change crops on the basis of changes in market demands and/or water availability. The individually irrigated surveyed plots were between 0,3 and 0,7 ha on average, and were mostly drip irrigated. Regarding irrigation management, 83% of the farmers reported low uniformity of applied water due to emitter blockage, changes in topography or low pressure. The lack of water metering devices in 60% of the farms made it difficult to control the level of applied water. Around half of the farms have developed facilities for water storage such as ponds or tanks, which give them better water control and flexibility. There is ample variations in agronomic practices such as planting dates and density, but they were well adapted to local conditions, mineral fertilization rates were in line with intensive horticultural practices, but not used in olive production where only manure is commonly applied. Among the problems and risks faced, the majority (62%) perceived the decline in groundwater levels as their principal problem, and saw a combination of modern irrigation technology and advanced training for its use as the solution to this problem.
Baseline study
Palestine conducted an excellent study on determining the baseline of water productivity (in terms of production against water applied) in a large number of crops, both outdoors and under protected cultivation. Biophysical WP was determined, as well as the economic WP, total and for the irrigation water. As expected, there was ample variations in the WP levels for every crop but a tendency was observed in that more recent studies reported higher WP values than older studies, suggesting the progress in the adoption of improved knowledge and technology for the management of crops and water. The values reported are in line with those observed internationally and in the NENA region. It was found that WP values increased as good agricultural practices such as adequate fertilization were adopted, new varieties were introduced and improved water management was disseminated
Water productivity (biophysical or economic production against actual evapotranspiration) recently introduced is a very important concept to be adopted for the determination of the gap between the current and the potential productivity of certain crops. In order, to improve the perception of the farmer on his productivity, he has to be aware on the gap between his current productivity and the potential productivity estimated through certain techniques. Besides the concept and notion of WP still have not been used widely by most of the academic and applied researchers in Palestine and most of the literature has been using irrigation water efficiency as a parameter to evaluate the water in this important sector. The reasons for this are the lack of data to assess the WP and the confusion between different types of aspects and indicators are constraining the adoption of this option.
Farmers Field Schools
It is worthy to mention that Farmers Field Schools FFSs show significant results on crop production, economic return, which indeed, the good agricultural practices that have been gained by the farmers through on job-learning approach improve their capacity and awareness in the context of increasing productivity and narrowing the gap between current and potential.