WATER RESOURCE SUPPLIES AND EFFICIENT UTILIZATION FOR
BIOPRODUCTION AND THE ROLE OF AGRO-ENVIRONMENTALEDUCATION IN KOREA

Seung Woo Park, Ph.DProfessor, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences
Seoul National UniversitySeoul, Korea
swpark@snu.ac.kr

INTRODUCTION
The Republic of Korea (Korea) like many countries in the Asia-Pacific Regions has
faced continuing challenges for securing more water resources and efficiently utilizingthem for sustainable bioproduction. In 1998, the total amount of water being used foragriculture was estimated to be 15.8 billion m3, or 48 percent of the total uses (MOCT,2001).

The agricultural water uses have been increased during the past three decadesof the economic development at such a remarkably rapid rate that the water uses now
are 3.5 times greater than that in 1965.

Most of the agricultural water is used forpaddy irrigation for rice, the stable food of Korea, and water demands for vegetable
cropping and other bioproduction are also increasing.
It is reported that nearly 45% of Korea renewable water resources are now in use, ina level that sustainable water resource development is no longer possible withoutsignificantly deteriorating ecosystems. Efforts should be made to control water demands
and to utilize the valuable resources more efficiently in all sectors.

It is no exception

for agriculture; water saving efforts should be made by improving irrigation efficiencies
or by any other means..
This paper presents the current status of water resource development and water
conservation efforts in agricultural sectors.

Results from a recent case study will bepresented to pinpoint issues of efficient agricultural water uses.

It will be followed bypresenting possible roles of educations, research and development for utilizing water
more competently.
LAND AND WATER RESOURCES
Cultivated Lands
The total area of Korea is 99,373 km2, and about 64% of the land is mountainous,leaving little land resources.

As of 2003, the cultivated land is 18.5 thousand km2,

among which 11.27 thousand km2 or 61% is paddy field and the rest 7.19 thousand km2,upland, orchards, and other farm lands.
Precipitation
The annual precipitation of Korea is 1,276 mm in the part of the Korean Peninsula,and 1,283mm when the Jeju Island is included. It fluctuates considerably from year toyear.

During the past 94 years, the recorded minimum annual precipitation was 754

mm in 1939 and the maximum was 1,782mm in 1998.

Annual precipitation tends toincrease recently and so does the variability (MOCT, 2001).
Uneven distributions and great fluctuations of monthly precipitation are the featuresof our water resources.

During the monsoon and typhoon seasons from June to

September, nearly the two-third of annual precipitation (65.7%) is recorded.

Meanmonthly precipitation other than the four months is 58.3mm, and rain-fed farming may
be vulnerable to drought damages.
Water Resources
Figure 1 summarizes the availability and use of Korea water resources (MOCT,2001).

The total annual water resources are 127.6 billion m3.

The renewable water

resources which are defined to be the available water minus evapotranspiration losses
are 73.1 billion m3 or 57 % of the total.

The total annual water uses were estimated tobe 33.1 billion m3, or 45 percent of the renewable water.

The water demands arebalanced by the supply from streamflow (48.6%), reservoirs and dams (40.2%), andgroundwater (11.2%). The water demands will be increased, and the water shortage up
to 1.8 billion m3 (5.4 % of present water uses) is expected by 2011 even after substantial

water saving efforts are put into practice (MOCT, 2001).

Total water resources : 127.6 (100%)

Evapo-transpiration : 54.5 (43%)

River runoff : 73.1 (57%)

Runoff on flood time

Runoff on dry season

49.3 (39%)

23.8 (18%)

Losses to

Stored inRiver water

Ground water

the sea

damsuse

use

40.0

13.3

16.1

3.7

Total use

Domestic use

7.3 (22%)

Industrial use

2.9 (9%)33.1

Agricultural use 15.8 (48%)(26%)

In-stream use

7.1 (12%)Figure 1 Annual average water resources in Korea.

AGRICULTURAL WATER USES
Irrigation Development
The Korea government has made great efforts to continuously develop irrigationwater resources for ensuring stable rice production. A total of 8.8 thousand km2 ofpaddy was converted to the irrigated areas, as of the end of 2002, which accounted 77%

of the total paddy fields (Table 1). The rest 2.58 thousand km2 of paddy fields remains
to be rain-fed areas. However, about 49 % of the irrigated paddy field is subject topossible damages from 10-year recurrence drought because of insufficient water
resources. More than half of existing irrigation reservoirs were built before 1945, andmany are filled with too much silt to function properly.

The half (49%) of thepumping stations are older than 20 years, and irrigation facilities are also deteriorated.
Table 1 Irrigated Paddy Field Areas in Korea (as of the end of 2002).

Year

Total Paddy Field(103 ha)Irrigated Paddy
Field Area(103 ha)Partially IrrigatedPaddy Field(103 ha)Percentage of
Irrigated Paddy
Field (%)

1970

1,284745

No data

58.0

1980

1,307893

No data

68.4

1990

1,345988

357

73.4

2002

1,138880

258

77.3

Integrated Water Management
Significant changes in irrigation practices have been taken place in recent years.
Conventional paddy irrigation during growing seasons is being changed to year-roundwater supplies for the bioproduction.

The peak water supply period for paddy fields

has been shortened due to the mechanized rice transplanting.

Water demands in rural

regions increase with more acreage of irrigated vegetable crop planting.

And themanual on-farm irrigation management is not well carried out as aging farmers become
the majority.
To cope with the changing irrigation practices, Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry(MAF) has encouraged and supported financially many water saving efforts like 1) themaximization of water utilization, 2) the direct seeding of rice on paddy, 3) the repair
and reinforcement of existing dams and canals, and 4) the installation of telemetering(TM) and telecontrol (TC) instrumentation systems, 5) the networking of adjacent waterresources, and 6) the automation of on-farm water management for large irrigation
districts of 3 km2 or more.
A pilot study on the TM/TC and the centralized integrated irrigation management
systems at the Seongju district (having 3,530 ha of irrigation areas) has shown thatsignificant water saving has been achieved through better irrigation scheduling andmore uniform water distribution.

The saved water is now being used to irrigate

additional areas outside of the original district, and to be taken for domestic watersupply.

The cost of the integrated water management system has been paid off fromthe water saving.
Institutional Aspects
Korea has dual institutional systems to operate and manage the irrigation facilities.

Korea Agricultural and Rural Infrastructure Corporation (KARICO) takes in charge oflarger irrigation districts over 50ha of the duty areas, while local governments (city orcounty) manage small-size duty areas of 5 to 50 ha. KARICO was founded byconsolidating regional independent Farmland Improvement Associations (FIA) andAgricultural Development Corporation (ADC), both of which were responsible for theoperation and management of irrigation systems. Such institutional changes could help
improve overall irrigation systems performance.

No concrete findings, however, havebeen available to justify the institutional change.
Other Features of Irrigation Systems
The author (2001) reported that some features of Korea paddy irrigation systems are1) small duty areas for each irrigation water resource, 2) not enough capacities of thewater resources and aging problems of the delivery systems, 3) low irrigation
efficiencies in conveyance and on-farm management, and 4) the water quality
degradation in irrigation reservoirs. Some of those may be unique, and others arefound everywhere throughout the world.

Further discussions may also be found inreferences like MAF (2004).
ROLES OF EDUCATION AND RESEARCH
Education and Professional Development

Educational programs for irrigation are provided in agricultural high schools, juniorcolleges, and universities.

And technical training and continuing professional

education programs of various levels are offered to irrigation systems administrators,operators and managers.

Professional engineer programs are also established toaccredit irrigation engineering program.
Some technical high schools offer irrigation technical courses.

High school

graduates from those programs are eligible to become assistant technicians and, after
due training, work as operators for irrigation facilities such as agricultural dams andpumping stations.
curricula.

There are three junior colleges which offer agricultural technology

Several technical junior colleges also offer irrigation courses in civilengineering programs.
Eleven universities offer agricultural engineering (or soil and water major) curricula.
All the universities offer graduate programs toward master and Ph.D degrees.

College

graduates are eligible to become qualified civil engineers accredited by an agency
authorized by the Korea government.

Professional engineer certificates in areas ofirrigation are also issued by the agency to qualified engineers who have minimum six
year careers in irrigation engineering, and pass qualification tests.
On-job training programs for irrigation system design, operation and management arecurrently offered by the Education and Training Center, KARICO.

The short courses

on pumping station operations and irrigation scheduling are developed for field
operators. The Center also initiates a web-based self-training course for many fieldoperators. Government Office Training Center, MAF also offers short courses forgovernment employees.
It is clear that irrigation engineering curricula in higher educational programs play animportant role of developing new technology for and promoting the efficient operationand management of irrigation systems.

Professional career development programs

offer opportunities for engineers in practice to learn new and advanced technologies for
integrated irrigation system management.
Research and Development
Like in many engineering disciplines, research and development programs areimportant to the technical advances in irrigation engineering.

For instance, integrated

irrigation management systems based on TM/TC technology have been developed atuniversities and research institutes. Other recent achievements worth noting are: 1)
Wastewater reuse researches to make use of reclaimed water from domestic sewer
treatment plants (MOST, 2004), 2) field investigation of irrigation return flow (Im et al.,2002), 3) decision support systems for irrigation water management (MAF and RDC,

1999), and 4) multifunctionality of irrigated rice culture (MAF, 2002).

Such roles

should be appreciated and more R&D programs supported to ensure continuing effortsof efficient water utilization for bioproduction in Korea.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONSThis paper presents the current status of the water resource supplies and utilization
for agriculture and the roles of agro-environmental education in Korea.

The water

resources become a limiting factor for sustainable economic development as water
withdrawal rates increase to a marginal level. The agricultural water uses have been
increased by 3.5 times during the fast three decades. Yet, nearly one-quarter of paddy
lands remain rain-fed, and irrigation water supply is needed for increasing
bioproduction.

Water conservation measures and rehabilitation of existing irrigation

facilities are important to improve irrigation efficiencies at on-farm and irrigation
district levels.

Education and professional career development as well as research anddevelopment efforts have been proven to play important roles on the development ofirrigation technology.
REFERENCES
Im, S. J., S. W. Park, and C. E. Park, 2002. Modeling irrigation return flow on small
agricultural watersheds, 2000 ASAE Annual International Meeting, Paper No. 002128.

Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Korean National Committee on Irrigation and Drainage (KCID), 2001. History ofirrigation in Korea. Ansan, Korea. 198p.

Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry of Korea (MAF), 1999. The integrated agriculturaland rural water development and management plan (summary). Seoul. Korea (inKorean).

MAF, 2001. 10-year plan for rural water development (revised), Seoul, Korea (inKorean). pp.15-24.

MAF, 2003. Yearbook of agricultural land and water development statistics, Seoul
Korea. 679p.

MAF, 2004. Korean Agriculture and Rural Water Management. 40p.

Ministry of Construction and Transportation (MOCT), 2001. Water Vision 2020, Seoul,Korea (in Korean). pp. 5-13.

Ministry of Science and Technology of Korea (MOCT), 2004. Application forwastewater reclamation and reuse, 21st Century Frontier R&D Program – Sustainable
Water Resources Research Center. 223p.

Park, S. W., 2002. Strategies for efficient management of agricultural water resources,
2002 Korean Agricultural Science Symposium. pp. 346-368.