Agricultural Water Management in the Netherlands; 10 Years of Experience with Co-Operation and Knowledge Sharing Between Farmers and Regional Water Authorities in Order to Achieve Environmental Objectives

This paper presents the Dutch ‘Delta Plan for Agricultural Water Management’ (in Dutch: ‘Deltaplan Agrarisch Waterbeheer’; DAW). This is a voluntary, tailor-made initiative in which farmers, water authorities and their organisations work together to achieve environmental objectives, and to prevent damage caused by droughts and floods, while ensuring an economically strong and sustainable agricultural sector. Drawing on a decade of DAW experiences, this study highlights achievements, lessons learned, and future challenges. Results show that, even though DAW is under pressure due to a shortage of independent advisors, DAW facilitated information and knowledge exchange, and trust-building, which supports participating farmers to improve agricultural management practices. Furthermore, the voluntary nature of DAW, while a strength in that it enables farmers to adopt measures tailored to their specific circumstances, also results in a fragmented pattern of participation. This uneven uptake makes it difficult to assess the effectiveness of measures at the farm scale in relation to the realisation of contributing to EU objectives, such as the European Water Framework Directive (WFD).