Farmers speak of challenges, opportunities from irrigation

What you need to know:

  • Irrigation is underdeveloped in Tanzania despite the availability of millions of hectares suitable for the practice, which could increase food production

Dar es Salaam. Despite its potential to revolutionise food production, irrigated agriculture is still underutilised in Tanzania.

Irrigation is underdeveloped, despite the availability of millions of hectares suitable for the practice, which could significantly contribute to the development of the agro-economy.

Even in areas that receive enough rainfall, crop production remains relatively low due to other factors, mainly poor management of water resources and pests.

Most of the rainfall that falls is lost because there are inadequate facilities for collecting and storing rainwater for future use.

Farmers who have used irrigation argue that, despite a less established national infrastructure, watering crops puts agriculture back under the cultivator’s control.

Mr Ally Bitu, a farmer from Mkula Village in Kilombero District, Morogoro Region, told The Citizen that after 30 years of irrigation farming, he has accumulated enough experience.

There are numerous opportunities in irrigation, particularly at this time when the world is struggling with the effects of climate change, which are causing a scarcity in food supply, he claims.

Mr Bitu claims that he is currently growing sugarcane and paddy with water from sources in the Udzungwa National Park.

Furthermore, Mr Bitu says he produces up to four tonnes of paddy despite relying on poor irrigation infrastructure.

“We are lucky because water is available throughout the year. We need to have our irrigation systems overhauled,” he says.

Mr Bitu is aware that even with irrigation, he and other farmers in the area have not completely escaped the vagaries of climate change. The situation might worsen if the global scourge is not addressed.

“We pray that authorities continue to safeguard the water sources in the Udzungwa National Park for sustainable availability of water, which is our major lifeline,” he stresses.

He asks the authorities to build water reservoirs, which will assure them of the availability of water for their activities.

“Drying out the water sources will make the situation even worse,” he says.

Another local farmer, Ms Hadija Nowile, claims that irrigation farming has made it possible for her to grow vegetables, paddy, and sugar cane, which earn her enough cash to support her family. “After many people have harvested past the rainy season, we use their land to produce crops through irrigation farming. This time, we grow vegetables for home consumption and sell the excess,” she explains.

She says abundant water from Udzungwa National Park makes them the luckiest people, outlining the only impediment as poor irrigation infrastructure.

“We’ve been relying on the basic irrigation infrastructure that we built ourselves. If possible, the government should assist us by improving the irrigation infrastructure in our area,” she said.

“This is because we are sure that with good infrastructure, we will be able to produce more food for our benefit and that of the country,” she says.

She observes that due to the area’s mountainous terrain, it is difficult to irrigate the areas that are much higher up during the dry season. Furthermore, she notes that because of poor infrastructure, they manage to farm only 100 hectares out of a total of 254 hectares conducive for irrigation in the area.

“With good infrastructure, we could have been able to produce more food with the land that is left unutilized,” she notes.

Another farmer in the area, Ms Felister Mwaka, says her children have gone to school thanks to irrigation, but the previous season was difficult due to pest infestations that destroyed the crops.

“Livestock, mainly elephants, are also a menace to our activities. They invade our farms frequently from the national park,” she recounts. She said in the past, elephants were not a problem, but they started to invade their farms in 2019 during the dry season. However, pests are a problem during the rainy season.

Ifakara Town Council’s agriculture department head, Mr Elia Shemtoe, agrees that elephant invasion is a major challenge.

“It is only in recent years that they have started invading people’s farms in the search for food. But it is a big problem,” he says.

He notes that to contain the growing problem, the government is creating a wildlife passageway that will serve as a corridor to direct the animals far away from people’s farms as they move to the Mwalimu Nyerere National Park.

He adds that without proper passageways, they would continue to wander into people’s farms.

The council has a total of 8,355.8 hectares with traditional irrigation infrastructure, and only 2,542 hectares have been equipped with modern infrastructure.

Furthermore, he says 3,256 farmers engage in irrigation farming, and they produce 8,834 metric tonnes of crops annually.

“Irrigation has improved the district’s annual food output and the revenue collected from crop cess,” he said.

The major challenges affecting irrigation development in the district are a lack of sufficient budget to build modern irrigation schemes and mitigating the effects of climate change.


Situation in Kenya

Climate change, according to Ms Phillis Wanjiru of the Sasamua Dam Village in Kinangop Sub County of Nyandarua in Central Kenya, has forced farmers to switch to irrigation farming.

“We have been practising rain-fed agriculture for many years. Climate change has taught us to rely on irrigation,” she says, adding that irrigation farming has significantly increased crop yields. Ms Wanjiru and her colleague started engaging in irrigation farming following efforts made by the Upper Tana Water Fund Project (UTNWFP) established in order to assist farmers living on the upstream side of Sasumua Dam.

Ms Wanjiru noted that before the intervention of UTNWFP, the yield in her farm was so low due to changes in weather patterns and poor soil, noting that now things are better.

“I have also started livestock keeping. This has always been my dream, but I didn’t know how to start,” she said, thanking UTNWFP for the education that transformed her life.

She says the new irrigation technologies have enabled her to conduct greenhouse farming that has enabled her to produce strawberries, arrowroots, and purple cabbage, among other crops, which have increased her earnings from agriculture.

Ms Wanjiru told journalists who visited her that she has a surprise for them, and she took them to her 2.5-acre farm, where she has planted maize and vegetables.

There was a cowshed near the farm where she kept her livestock.


Experts

A scientific advisor to the secretariat of the ninth World Water Forum in Dakar, Senegal, Dr Boubacar Barry, says adaptation to irrigation farming will greatly benefit the continent in tackling many challenges, including hunger and poverty. According to Dr Barry, irrigation must be a farmer-led activity in order to achieve food security in the region.

He calls on agricultural stakeholders to train small-scale farmers on the need to adapt and develop irrigation as a culture.

“Most small-scale farmers are not integrated into irrigated agriculture. They are used to rain-fed farming; now they must revert to new systems, which are somewhat different and necessitate work that they are not accustomed to,” explains Dr Barry.