Synthesis of water management improvement processes

External evaluation covered the period 9/78-1/81. The project is about 18 months behind schedule for the following reasons: the principal investigators did not have funding for the first 6 months; an Asian survey removed key personnel from other activities for 2 months; a training course in India took 18 months to schedule due to delayed government clearance; Missions and other donors have made unexpected demands for services; and the project timeframe is unrealistic. Nonetheless, the project is making reasonable progress and it appears that the quality of outputs will be excellent. Reviews of A.I.D. and World Bank water management projects are complete and the data have been compiled. The training course has been conducted in India and will now be refined and revised before it is offered in a second country. Four handbooks are in draft. The project is receiving good extension through newsletters, the training course, and other published outputs. The workshops should accordingly be cancelled. Outputs which have not been started include economics, labor, and energy analyses that depend on the completion of other outputs. The major lesson learned is that a service project which requires cooperation from institutions not related to the project (in this case, the Government of India) cannot readily be programmed on a pre-selected schedule. An action decision is to extend the project without funding for 18 months.