Why greening the agricultural modernization discourse? The case of small-scale projects in Turkey

International audienceTo develop access and control over water resources, the Turkish hydraulic bureaucracy is investing massively in three main sectors: hydroelectricity, irrigation and water supply. In this presentation, we will focus on the policies of irrigation development, through the study of small-dam projects. Small-dams are a rather basic technology, well mastered for decades in Turkey. However, in 2012, the Turkish Minister of Forestry and Water Affairs launched a program called 1000 small-dams in 1000 days. This program targets the development of the rural areas, which is supposed to take place through a switch from rain-fed agriculture to irrigated and marketable agriculture. There is no claim of green economy per se in this small-dam program. However, as in green growth discourses (Bergius et al., 2017; Buseth, 2017), the small-dams program claims to rely on a combination of profitable farming with a security regarding biodiversity and climate change, thanks to water storage: the economic development of rural areas must be ‘green’. This raises the questions of why greening the agricultural modernization discourse in a context of uncontested small-scale irrigation development by the state. In this presentation, we will focus on the diverse narratives around small-dam projects, reshaped over time