Jain Irrigation Systems Ltd.(JISL) and TERI signed a MoU today for establishing a Resource Centre for Water Use Efficiency. The MoU was signed by Dr. R.K. Pachauri, Director General of TERI and Anil Jain, Managing Director of Jain Irrigation Systems Ltd.

JISL, a multinational company headquartered in Jalgaon, Maharashtra, is a world leader in providing water solutions to agriculture and is a one stop shop providing a range of services encompassing supply of agricultural inputs, hi–tech agri–services from land preparation to post–harvest management, infrastructural development in agriculture and total solutions for water, soil and crop management.

The Water Resources division at TERI has been undertaking research studies on water resource management with the objective of providing people with equitable access to water while ensuring social, environmental, and economic sustainability of the resource. The thrust areas are Integrated Water Resources Management; Water and Climate Change; Water Supply and Sanitation; Mountain Water Resources Management; Socio–economic Analysis vis–à–vis Water Management; Water Systems Efficiency; Policy, Institutional, and Regulatory Reforms and Watershed Planning.

Water is a critical natural resource and almost 80–85% of the total water available is used in agriculture. In spiteof this, only 35–40%of areaunder cultivation is irrigated. The traditional irrigation system gives a water use efficiency of 25–30% while the rest of the water is wasted in flood method of irrigation, soil surface evaporation losses, deep percolation and seepage through canals. Almost 30% of the available energy is used in agriculture and this further adds to the cost to the irrigation.

It is therefore, necessary to give the farmer a complete package of practices along with water and energy conservation techniques together with a sustainable agriculture cropping plan.

TERI and JISL are active in a number of common areas such as Water Systems efficiency, Watershed planning, irrigation efficiency, etc. Both institutions believe that through collaboration, they can enhance their efforts in achieving Water Use efficiency, particularly in the agriculture sector, besides basic research, knowledge exchange and dissemination policy advocacy.

The Resource Centre for Water Use Efficiency would take a holistic and inclusive approach by engaging all the concernedstakeholders, including government bodies, NGOs, farmers, other research institutes, etc.

The centre proposes to carry out the following activities:

• Research activities with a focus on the broad theme of Water Use efficiency in Agriculture which is proposed to encompass sub–themes as listed below:
  • Benchmarking and evolving performance standards for Water Use in Agriculture
  • Innovative and efficient Water–use technologies
  • Best agricultural practices
  • Water Conservation and Watershed management
• Design and undertake research–based pilot projects that can demonstrate the practical application and feasibility of the project interventions in improving the water–use efficiency in agriculture
• Train and build capacity of all relevant Stakeholders on best practices in agricultural Water Use efficiency using the in–house expertise of TERI and JISL
• Create Awareness and design Sensitization programs on efficient water–use practices in agriculture and disseminate research findings through national and regional seminars, interactive mass–media, etc. on topics relevant to the overall theme of Water Use efficiency.
• Policy recommendation and advocacy with the National and State Governments
• Document, report and publish its work on a regular basis

The Centre is proposed to be set–up at two locations in India, one at TERI in Delhi and the other one at the corporate office of JISL in Jalgaon. The working and operation of these Centres would be initially supported by a core financial grant. Subsequently, the Centres are envisaged to become self–sustaining through external finance and continuous corporate support.

The joint initiative between Jain Irrigation and TERI will go a long way in providing sustainable solutions towards ensuring Food Security for the nation.

About JAIN IRRIGATION:

Our Company, Jain Irrigation Systems Limited (JISL) with more than 9000 associates worldwide and revenue of 50 billion rupees, is an Indian multinational company with manufacturing plants in 28 locations across the globe. It is engaged in manufacturing of Micro Irrigation Systems, PVC Pipes, HDPE Pipes, Plastic Sheets, Agro Processed Products, Renewable Energy Solutions, Tissue Culture Plants, Financial Services and other agricultural inputs since last 27 years. It has pioneered silent revolution with modern irrigation systems and innovative technologies in order to save precious water and has helped to get significant increase in crop yields, especially for millions of the small farmers. It has also ushered in new concept of large scale Integrated Irrigation Projects (IIP). All the products & services of JISL help create sustainable future while fulfilling it’s vision ‘Leave this world better than you found it’.

JISL is listed in NSE–Mumbai at JISL.JALEQS and in BSE at code 50029.