Harnessing market systems for water conservation in Jordan

The Water Innovation Technologies (WIT) programme is a large-scale application of the MSD approach to water conservation in Jordan. It ran from 2017 to 2022 and its main objective was to save water through the sustainable adoption of water-saving technologies and practices by farmers and households.

WIT worked on two market systems:

• agricultural irrigation
• domestic consumption

This report focuses exclusively on agricultural irrigation consumption. Agriculture is the biggest user of water globally. 

The programme led to total savings of 28 million cubic metres of water in the agricultural sector and at community and household levels. In addition to these impacts, the report discusses WIT’s evolution and the main areas of intervention from an MSD perspective.

Stakeholder engagement and partnership-building was important during the initial stages of implementation. This was followed by an effort to better align interventions with MSD principles, and a shift towards co-creation, piloting and improvement of the partners’ business models. 

As the programme matured, it continued deepening its partnerships and promoting business innovation, adoption of water saving technologies and crowding-in, through a combination of financial incentives, technical support and awareness-raising. 

The report concludes that WIT generated important lessons on how to use the MSD approach to save water on a large scale and that the programme’s evolution shows how important it is for a successful MSD team to be able to adapt swiftly to market requirements and unforeseeable challenges and opportunities.

Intervention description

The programme worked with key partners, including the International Center for Biosaline Agriculture, the International Water Management Institute, the Jordan River Foundation, and the Royal Scientific Society.

Specific interventions included improving marketing strategies for WST suppliers, training journalists and media staff on water conservation issues, and providing financial incentives through an Investment Fund (IF) to encourage innovation among WST suppliers. These interventions resulted in the optimisation of over 2,000 hectares of farmland and savings of 24 million cubic meters (MCM) of water in the agricultural sector, which represents almost 10 per cent of all underground water consumed by the sector in 2017.

The adoption rate of WSTs by farmers increased significantly, and many partners indicated their intention to continue using the promoted models beyond the programme's support.