Impact of Water Resources Protection on Local Ground Water Market (Report‪)‬

1. Introduction Localized village-level informal arrangement through which well owners sell irrigation services to other members of the community. Water may be lifted from open wells or tube wells, deep or shallow wells and may be transported to the buyers field either through lined or unlined field channels or through underground pipeline networks. According to [1], the emergence of water markets, both ground and surface water, has helped in increasing agricultural output. It has also widened the equalities in the rural areas and protected the interests of the small and marginal farmers and other weaker sections of the society. Where land holding are fragmented, most sellers of water are also buyers themselves. In areas irrigated through water markets, the intensity of irrigation may vary greatly. However, since the buyers can get water when they need, the productivity of water is high. Opportunity to buy small quantities of water at crucial periods of moisture stress enables small holders to take an additional crop. Water selling by private owners can have remarkable beneficial impacts on the incomes of water buyers and the economy of the community as a whole [2,3]. Some of the findings from [4] study in eastern and western Utter Pradesh about trends in ground water irrigation indicate that significant changes have taken place in respect of socio-economic features, role of ground water irrigation including ground water markets, productivity of crops and changing face of the rural elite. Marginal farmers are the biggest beneficiaries of ground water market. Nearly 60% of the farmers of this category irrigated their crop by water purchased from well owners making ground water accessible to socially and economically deprived sections of the society [5] Efficiency and equity benefits of ground water markets have an inadequate empirical grounding and are based on a 'one size fits all' model of water market that is insensitive to how ground water markets are shaped by natural, social and historical factors [6]. Performance of water market is in terms of the quality of irrigation service available for the depth and breadth of water trade, and the presence or absence of monopoly pricing. The impact of water market on cropping intensity, cropping pattern, labour use and crop yields achieved by water buyer compared to water extraction mechanism owners. When water is sold for cash, it may be priced on the basis of hectares (ha) irrigated of a particular crop or on the basis of hours of pumping [7].