Author : Adul Apinantara

Summary : The study was conducted to determine the nature and patterns of cooperation and conflict among the water users in tank irrigation systems and to correlate such patterns with some socio-psychological, economic, communication, physical and agronomic factors relating to the operation and maintenance of irrigation systems. Data were collected through intensive interviews from a stratified random sample of 220 water users in the service areas of three tank irrigation systems in Northeast Thailand. In this study, a great majority of the water users had a medium and high rate of participation in Water Users Association (WUA) activities. Most of the respondents had high degree of cooperation among themselves in water use. The water users had high level of participation in cleaning and repairing irrigation channels with greater number of them participating every time and occasionally. They also ranked the president or officer of WUA and the irrigation agent as first and second person who encouraged them to cooperate in such work, respectively. As regards the level of problems and conflict in using irrigation water in the system, most of the water users rated this as medium.