Workshop to Develope a Geo-Referenced Database of Irrigation Areas in the Nile Basin

Two technical workshops are scheduled, from 12 to 16 February and 26 February to 2 March 2007 respectively, at the project office in Entebbe to improve the database and GIS layer of existing areas under irrigation in the Nile Basin.

The project has invited two participants each per Nile country. The event will be facilitated by Mrs. Wageye Teshome, Dr. Stephen Ngigi, and Mr. Arjen Rotmans.

In view of the importance of irrigation in the Nile water balance, special attention is given to the development and validation of a detailed irrigation map. The data set will include the actual geographic locations of the irrigated areas, as well as a set of basic descriptors that qualify the irrigation schemes. This includes crop, type of water control, area equipped for irrigation, area effectively irrigated, etc.

National databases will be compared with international datasets and satellite imagery. These include FAO – Frankfurt GIAM, Aquastat, FAOstat, Africover, and Landsat. Particular attention will be given to using the MODIS space-greening tool developed by the project to estimate the extent of land equipped for irrigation that is effectively irrigated.

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