Agricultural Water Pricing: Turkey

Irrigated agriculture currently consumes 75 percent of total water consumption which corresponds to about 30 percent of renewable water availability. However incidents such as increasing urbanization, climate change and changing agricultural world commodity prices are expected to increase the sectoral competition for water resources and raise the need for major changes in water policies in the medium and the long run. Turkey is one of the world leaders in the transfer of irrigation schemes to water users organizations. The transfer of almost all large surface irrigations schemes (half of the total irrigated area) developed by the state to water users associations has been completed. However, the price of the irrigation water is still based on operation and maintenance costs in all irrigation schemes and it is charged on per hectare basis, differentiated according to the crop. The recuperation of capital costs has been low and remains to be law because of the legal framework. There is almost no volumetric pricing system in irrigation, whereas volumetric charges are common in domestic and industrial use. The user organizations determine the water charges based on expected operation, maintenance and investment cost for the year. The farmers using pumpin