Presentation by Vinay Nangia, Ph.D., ICARDA at The International Conference on Sustainability in the Water-Energy-Food Nexus, meeting in Bonn, Germany on May 19th and 20th 2014,

1. Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Valuation of Ecosystem Services for
Improving Agricultural Water Management
in Kazakhstan
Vinay Nangia, Ph.D.
Lead Agricultural Hydrologist
Int’l Center for Ag. Res. in Dry Areas (ICARDA)
Amman, Jordan

2. Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Study location

3. Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Background
Chardara reservoir was constructed:
in southern Kazakhstan in 1965
for irrigation and hydropower generation.
reservoir also supports many fragile
ecosystems such as:
• fisheries and livestock
• riparian forests and rangelands
• human population
• tourism

4. Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Background (cont’d)
But the volume of water in the reservoir
fluctuates by as much as 10-12 times from
winter to summer period, and
return flows from irrigated agriculture are
rich in nonpoint source pollutants and
adversely affect the downstream users of
this water

5. Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Site characteristics
South Kazakhstan Province
Turkestan city administration
area
Population in 2012 2,734,700 244,100
Population density 22,4 person per km2 33,0 person per km2
Total area, thousand km2 117.2 7.4
Number of agricultural units in
2012
74,050 4,968
Total cultivated area (ha) 772,183.8 38,944.1
Soil types Grey soils and grey brown soils
Bright southern and ordinary
serozems, sand and gravel
Agro climate characteristics Dry arid zone Dry arid foothill zone
Annual precipitation
Plain – 50-250 mm,
foothill – 750 mm
180-200 mm
Average air temperature
January -9.6°C in the north part,
-0.9°C in the south part
July +20/+30°C
January -10/-15°C
July +35/+40°C
Main economic drivers Agriculture Tourism, agriculture

6. Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Project builds on existing research
The Regional Environmental Center for Central
Asia (CAREC) has a GEF-funded 2 year project in
area aimed at creating cooperation
mechanisms between local stakeholders to
enhance ES provisioning
CAREC built linkages between nature reserve,
farmers, herders, schools and a local NGO
 WQ and
 Landscape aesthetics main ES

7. Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
 The nature reserve committed to develop a plan
for rational pasture management in its buffer
zone to limit soil erosion and grazing in the
Khantagi riverbed
 Water points were built on remote pastures to
destock degraded rangelands
 The nature reserve held trainings on alternative
sources of income such as
greenhouse construction and management, and
promoted the use of water-saving technologies (drip
irrigation)

8. Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Hypothesis of this study
• Improving agricultural water management
will lead to improvement of other
downstream ecosystem services sharing
same water, and
• through the identification and valuation of
main water-related ecosystem services, a
plan can be developed for payment for
improvement of agricultural water
management

9. Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Objectives
Identify key drivers of water use and water-use
change in the lower Syr Darya River Basin and their
economic impact on water users;
Develop a set of mechanisms, including incentive-
based ones, to promote improved water uses, with a
focus on women-led, agriculture-based, income-
generating activities;
Mainstream project results into development
planning and policy making of the Republic of
Kazakhstan

10. Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Methodology
• Baseline assessment
Ag. water management modeling (SWAT)
Stakeholder mapping (GIS)
Drivers of water uses (survey)
• Improvement activities
Cap. building and women empowerment
Dev. Incentive-based mechanism
Application of H2O-saving technologies
Cap. building of policy makers

11. Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Outputs
Database of stakeholders and water users
MS these on value chains and VES
Well-calibrated SWAT model estimating
Discharge
N, P, K
Pesticides
Sediment
Trade-off options under different scenarios of
changing ecosystem services provision
Policy briefs

12. Thank you