General consensus among policy-makers in the developing world and aid agencies is that the lack of capacity is constraining the development of irrigated agriculture. Although this concern is not new, it is now receiving much attention in the irrigation and drainage world where it is becoming an issue in its own right rather than being embedded in infrastructure investment projects. This publication contains a synthesis of a workshop that brought together a range of case studies from different parts of the world, as well as three keynote papers prepared for the workshop based on the available literature and experience.