Access to irrigation and the escape from poverty: evidence from Northern Mali

For farmers in the poorest regions of northern Mali, reliable access to water during the crop&rsquo;s life cycle is critical. Because of the arid climate, the most common form of irrigation here involves the use of motorised pumps to redistribute water from the Niger River throughout a canal irrigation system. Consequently, household, village and international organisation partnerships run small-scale village-level projects (covering 30-40 hectares) and larger-scale projects (500 hectares) in the area. But have these projects improved poor people&rsquo;s welfare? In this context, a new paper brought out by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) examines the impact of internationally-financed irrigation projects on poverty using data from a&nbsp;multi-topic household survey conducted in northern Mali in 1997&ndash;98 and again in 2006. <br /><br />The report adopts&nbsp;an econometric strategy to estimate the direct effects of irrigation on household consumption, agricultural production and nutrient intakes and discusses the secondary effects of irrigation, including livestock accumulation, food sharing within villages, household composition and child labuor. The latter variables measure how households choose to allocate their additional surplus. This information is tracked for households from 10 villages over the eight year period to find that: there have been significant positive increases in total household consumption, agricultural production and caloric and protein intakes for households who have access to irrigation the benefits of agricultural production induced by irrigation technology do not transfer one-to-one into gains in household consumption consuming the gains from increased agricultural production from irrigation is not the only household strategy for increasing welfare: households also save these gains or share some of them with others in their village, either for purely altruistic reasons or as an informal kind of intra-village insurance against future shocks while there was no effect on the hours children spent on farming in households with access to irrigation, the time they spent at&nbsp;school decreased which emerges as a potentially offsetting secondary effect of irrigation likewise, the number of men in households with access to irrigation increased by almost one additional member over the sample period, an effect with the potential of offsetting&nbsp;household consumption gains stemming from increased agricultural production <br />The report concludes that overall, additional&nbsp;investment in northern Mali&rsquo;s village-based irrigation system is likely to beneficial and has the potential of generating a green revolution in the area. In terms of research, it recommends for further investigation into the effects of&nbsp;irrigation on intra-village and intra-household inequality including&nbsp;gender relations. <br />