This study examines the impact of Tungan-Kawo dam irrigation project on rice production and livelihood of small holder farmers in Wushishi Local Government Area of Niger State, Nigeria. The specific objectives were to describe the socio-economic characteristics of small-holder rice farmers participating in Tungan-Kawo irrigation project; determine the level of adoption of recommended rice production practices by participants; assess the impact of Tungan-Kawo irrigation project on rice output, yield, income and level of living of the people; determine the socio-economic and institutional factors influencing the adoption of recommended rice production practices in Tungan-Kawo irrigation project and describe the constraints encountered by the participants and the management in the implementation of the project. Primary data were obtained by the use of structured questionnaire administered to 180 respondents comprising of 90 participants and 90 nonparticipants. Descriptive statistics, z-test statistic and multiple regression were used to analyse the data . Descriptive statistics was used for objectives 1, 2 and 3, the z-statistic was used for objective 3 to compare the differences in rice output, income and level of living between participants and non-participants. Multiple regression was used to analyse objective 4 of the study. The findings revealed that the average age of participants and nonparticipants was 44 years. About 98% of both participants and non-participants were male while only 2% participants were female. These results showed that the adoption of recommended rice production practices was very high in the study area. More than three quarter of the participants were married with average household size of 7 persons. The average rice production output of participants was estimated at1.175tons per annum while non-participants was 0.767 ton per annum . It was revealed that the average rice yield for the participants was 3076.67kg/hectare and the yield of non-participants was 1103.33kg/hectare. The income of participants was N5936.89 while non-participants earned N21322.22. The participants' level of living was significantly higher (p<0.05) 5% than non participants. The findings in this study indicate that Tungan-Kawo irrigation project had positive impact on rice output, income and level of living of participants. The results of multiple regression shows that age, gender, education, extension contact and membership of cooperative society were the most important variables influencing the adoption of recommended rice production practices in Tungan-Kawo irrigation project. The participants revealed that inadequate capital, high cost of operation and maintenance were some of their constraints. The Federal Government should subsidize farmers' inputs such as fertilizer, agro-chemicals, irrigation facilities.