The power and interest indicators of the stakeholders of a Water User Association around Bengawan Solo River, Indonesia

This data article presents the information on stakeholders’ power and interest indicators in agricultural irrigation management. The data were collected from a WUA (Water User Association) called Sekar padi which operates around Bengawan Solo river, East Java, Indonesia. This data article contains two major data. The first data consists of the power indicator from both primary and secondary stakeholders of WUAs. The second data is the stakeholders ‘interest indicator of WUAs in agricultural irrigation management. The data were collected from observations, Focus Group Discussion (FGD) and interview. These data will be beneficial for policy makers to determine the suitable programs for agricultural irrigation management and for researchers who want to conduct similar studies in developing countries.


a b s t r a c t
This data article presents the information on stakeholders' power and interest indicators in agricultural irrigation management. The data were collected from a WUA (Water User Association) called Sekar padi which operates around Bengawan Solo river, East Java, Indonesia. This data article contains two major data. The first data consists of the power indicator from both primary and secondary stakeholders of WUAs. The second data is the stakeholders 'interest indicator of WUAs in agricultural irrigation management. The data were collected from observations, Focus Group Discussion (FGD) and interview. These data will be beneficial for policy makers to determine the suitable programs for agricultural irrigation management and for researchers who want to conduct similar studies in developing countries.
& 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Subject area
Social Sciences More specific subject area Rural studies Type of data Tables  How data was acquired observations, focus group discussions, and interview using interview guidelines.

Data accessibility
The data is included in this article

Values of the data
The knowledge in the power indicators of each type of stakeholder and the level of category of the stakeholders will be beneficial in determining the right stakeholder for implementing a particular agricultural irrigation program.
The knowledge in the interest indicators of WUA's stakeholders will enable the formulation of the right programs for agricultural irrigation management.
The data on power and interest indicators presented in this study can be used as comparison for the data obtained from similar studies conducted in other developing countries.
Researcher from the social sciences will be able to draw from the power and interest indicators to conduct other studies related to agricultural irrigation management.

Data
There are two main data presented in this article. The first data is a stakeholder power indicator in agricultural irrigation management. Stakeholders are influencing or being influenced individuals or groups to achieve certain goals. Freeman [3] believes that stakeholders have position, power, and interest related to certain intention. Moreover, Grimble and Wellard [4] also claim that there are authoritative linkages between the power and the type of stakeholders. According to Morgenthau [5], power is also a major goal of policy or even a determining motive of any political action. The power indicator is related to authority and networking [2]. In this paper, the power indicators of WUAs stakeholder can be categorised into four indicators, they are (1) authority, (2) capability and capacity, (3) credibility, (4) networking. These indicators are determined in relation to the type of stakeholder, i.e. primary or secondary, in carrying out the tasks and obligations in managing agricultural irrigation in the village. In addition, there are also levels of categories of stakeholders. In this case, the levels are categorized into very high, high, fairly high, and low. The tabulation of the power indicator of the stakeholders of Sekarpadi WUA is presented in Table 1. Description: Authority is the right to take action or right to make rules to govern others. Capability and capacity are measures of the ability of an entity (i.e. department, organization, people) to achieve its objectives, especially in relation to the overall mission.
Credibility is a power to generate trust.
Networking is a useful and mutually beneficial relationship.

1) Primary Stakeholders
Very High-Power Stakeholder: a) Informants Number 1-as a chairman, democratically elected by the villagers. High Power Stakeholder a) Informants Number 10-35 have the capability, credibility, capacity to assist the core management in managing agricultural irrigation. They convey aspirations and problems (i.e. floods, water supplies delay and others) from HIPPA members to the core management to get immediate response or problem solving. b) Informant Number 39 is a member with capability and capacity to assess HIPPA's member performance at accountability report meeting. For the example: Accountability report cannot be accepted when unresolved issue arises (i.e. financial problems).

2) Secondary Stakeholders
Fairly High Power Informants Number 40-47 do not intervene in water distribution management, but they have capacity in solving water management problems. For the examples: (1) public works service department and water resources sub-field department support in irrigation infrastructure development, (2) department of Agriculture through association of farmers group in villages assist farming activities (i.e. Distributing subsidized fertilizer, eradicating pest and so on).
Low Power Informants Numbers 48-50 do not have power over HIPPA in agricultural irrigation management. However, they can give suggestions related to water distributions finding issues and rice farming.
The second data present the interest indicators of WUA's stakeholder. According to Bryson [1], interest is the will and desire of a person or a group for an activity. The interest indicators of WUA's stakeholders can be categorized into three: (1) hope, (2) reputation, and (3) potential benefit. Similar to the stakeholders' power indicator, there are also levels of categories, which in this case is called "degree of interest". The levels are very high, high, fairly high, and low. The stakeholders' interest indicator tabulation in agricultural irrigation management is shown in Table 2.

Experimental design, materials and methods
There are six WUAs in the district that use the Bengawan Solo River water for agricultural irrigation. These six WUAs are: a) WUA in Bandungrejo Village; b) WUA in Plandirejo Village; c) WUA in Klotok Village; d) WUA in Kedungrejo Village; e) WUA in Magersari Village; and f) WUA in Plumpang Village. The data presented in this article is from the most experienced and successful WUA, i.e. Sekarpadi WUA in Bandungrejo Village. There were three steps taken to collect the data.
First, participatory observations were conducted on the work system of the WUA in agricultural irrigation management, which includes the water distribution system, irrigation network, and stakeholder performance to overcome the problems faced by HIPPA in agricultural irrigation management to success in farm cultivating. Second, conducting Focus Group Discussion (FGD) among HIPPA's members. Third, conducting individual interviews using the interview guidelines (Appendix). Interview guidelines for FGDs are directed to know, and understand the issues faced by HIPA in managing agricultural irrigations. It was also aimed at knowing who has the power (authority, capability, credibility, capacity, and networking) to solve the problems, and what the strategies are to solve the problems.
The data collected were then classified based on the power and interest levels of each stakeholder. To ease the readability of the collected data, the tabulation of the data was presented in the form of tables (see Table 1 and Table 2). These data will be beneficial for policy makers and researchers to know the conditions of the power and interest of the people in this rural area. The data can also be used as the basis for conducting similar research in other villages in developing countries.