Agricultural Production and Irrigation Management: The Case of Irrigated Rice Production in Kenya

In Sub Saharan Africa, yields from rice have continued to stagnate and Kenya is no exemption. The most common type of rice in Kenya is lowland rice grown under irrigation. This paper looks at how the change of management affects the productivity in national rice irrigated schemes in Kenya namely Mwea, Ahero, West Kano and Bunyala. By use of both descriptive analysis as well as panel data regression using the fixed effects approach, this paper finds that there is no enough evidence to support the hypothesis that community managed schemes perform better than government managed schemes, for the period under study 1985-2006. In Kenya the management of irrigation schemes has shifted from government managed scheme to community managed irrigation schemes. We also find that under state owned irrigation schemes, rice production deteriorated as the government failed to provide a clear policy guideline on irrigation despite the viability and potential of irrigation to improve agricultural production. Relevance to Development Studies Several studies have been conducted in the area of agriculture in Kenya concerning the measurement of agricultural productivity. Most of them however have not looked at the analysis of irrigated rice production. Given the fact that Kenya as a country has a huge deficit in the production of rice which is the common staple food in the country, it is important to undertake a study on rice production especially on how the schemes are managed and how changes in management styles affect productivity. In the long run, this will help to improve the yields and hence reduce the gap between demand and supply.