Innovation Lab For Small Scale Irrigation

Innovation Lab For Small Scale Irrigation

Events

Making irrigation financing solutions work for everyone: Cultivating Equality 2021 conference contribution

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Making financing tools and solutions more inclusive can provide women farmers with equitable opportunities for accessing irrigation equipment and succeeding in agripreneurship.

At Cultivating Equality: Advancing Gender Research in Agriculture and Food Systems, a virtual conference that focused on the role gender research can play to overcome marginalization and social exclusion, Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Small Scale Irrigation (ILSSI) Director Nicole Lefore presented recent research on gender biases in asset-based financing tools used in the small scale irrigation sector.

It is well established that women farmers face higher socio-cultural barriers and credit constraints than men, preventing them from investing in productive irrigation assets and realizing their entrepreneurial aspirations. ILSSI is supporting efforts to overcome such barriers by co-developing new, gender-responsive financing tools with private sector solar irrigation companies.

In general, solar irrigation pump companies in sub-Saharan Africa are attempting to fill a credit gap through asset-based financing, which can enable people ‘at the bottom of the pyramid’, including women farmers, to overcome credit barriers. However, companies’ credit risk assessment tools are not designed to be gender sensitive, and companies do not even target women farmers as potential clients.

How to reach women farmers

In recent research, combining a literature review, tool analysis and action research, Lefore and colleagues investigated whether asset-based financing tools and solutions can be made more inclusive and thereby increase women’s access to productive assets. Interim findings have revealed that even non-asset-based financing products do not necessarily overcome the main constraints limiting women’s access to credit for assets, and financial instruments using new approaches may still be unresponsive to women farmers and value chain actors.

Instead, the preliminary findings indicate that knowledge sharing through multi-stakeholder dialogues can raise awareness about women farmers as a market segment and that reaching women farmer clients requires a targeted marketing and finance approach. The research also revealed that some innovative companies are adapting their marketing and financial tools to expand their client base to include women farmers.

A pathway toward women’s empowerment

This could be good news for women farmers in that other research presented at Cultivating Equality contributed to establishing a link between small scale irrigation and women’s empowerment.

In Small-Scale Irrigation (SSI) and Women’s Empowerment (WE): Lessons from Northern Ghana, Elizabeth Bryan of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and her co-authors indicate that small scale irrigation has benefits for women, but it is not always the most desirable pathway to women’s empowerment. However, asset ownership – along with control over income and production decisions – do seem to contribute to women’s empowerment.

Still, achieving asset ownership remains a stumbling block. Despite the link between asset ownership and empowerment, as Bryan and co-authors point out, women face considerable resource constraints, such as lack of secure land use rights and access to labor, that further reduce their ability to get credit, and therefore interventions that strengthen women’s opportunities are needed to break the multiple and reinforcing boundaries to asset ownership. These insights help inform ILSSI’s continued work with the private sector to target women through gender-responsive asset-based financing tools.

Supporting solar irrigation companies to break down markets and lift up smallholder farmers in Ghana

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byThai Thi Minh, Senior Researcher, and Abena Ofosu, Senior Research Officer, Innovation Scaling, IWMI

In the Upper East region of Ghana, most smallholder farmers still rely on watering cans and buckets for irrigating the tomato, pepper, onion, and other vegetable crops they grow during the dry season. This type of irrigation is both labor intensive and time consuming, while more advanced irrigation technologies, such as motorized pumps, could boost farmers’ incomes, improve their health and resilience, and increase the supply of nutritious foods.

In the past, farmers in this area have used both electric irrigation pumps, running off the electric grid when available, and petrol- and diesel-powered motorized pumps, but both options are costly. Now, solar-powered irrigation pumps are emerging as an attractive, affordable alternative, but these kinds of pumps are not yet readily available in the Upper East region.

Solar-powered irrigation pumps are emerging as an attractive, affordable solution. Photo: Thai Thi Minh/IWMI.

That’s why the International Water Management Institute (IWMI), through the USAID-supported Africa Research in Sustainable Intensification for the Next Generation (Africa RISING) and the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Small Scale Irrigation (ILSSI), has been supporting irrigation equipment suppliers in Ghana to expand into this new market, including by breaking the market down into distinct segments of farmers that could access and benefit from solar-powered irrigation pumps in different ways.

Market segmentation for solar-powered irrigation pumps

Ghana’s Upper East region offers an attractive market for companies selling solar-powered irrigation pumps, with opportunities for them to establish sales outlets, expand customer bases, and reach and improve profitability by making their products accessible at the doorsteps of farmers.

These opportunities were discussed at the recently held third meeting of a multi-stakeholder dialogue platform in Ghana, established by IWMI and ILSSI to bring together stakeholders from government, research organizations, irrigation equipment suppliers, financial services, and value chain actors to innovate and facilitate the expansion of small scale irrigation.

Stakeholders from government, research organizations, irrigation equipment suppliers, financial services, and value chain actors met to discuss opportunities and challenges. Photo: Thai Thi Minh/IWMI.

Precise market segmentation is key for companies expanding into new markets. It allows them to plan for and use diverse business models to reach different and diverse groups of farmers. However, few solar pump companies have assessed and targeted market segments as they have established operations in Ghana.

IWMI scientists therefore undertook a market segmentation exercise within the Upper East region, basing it on farmers’ access to land, water, irrigation and production arrangements, financial capital and potential, and product preferences. As a result, four market segments were identified, namely resource-rich individual farmers, resource-limited individual farmers, farmer groups, and mobile farmers who during the dry season move from their residential area to irrigate fields close to publicly funded irrigation schemes.

Understanding these segments is useful for companies because each group of potential customers has distinct options and needs, particularly regarding what type of pump is suitable for them, whether they have capital for the investment on hand, and whether their preference is to make a one-time payment or to access some type of financing.

Creating opportunities for companies and farmers

During the meeting, held on held on May 4, 2021, Osman Sahanoom Kulendi, managing director of Pumptech, a distributor of solar-powered irrigation pumps, shared insights into how they have segmented the market for their range of LORENTZ PS2 solar irrigation pumps, which they offer bundled with what they call PAY-OWN financing, a type of asset-based financing that can give farmers access to solar pumps without the usual collateral or credit history required for a loan.

Pumptech’s findings build on IWMI’s initial assessment of the market segments in the region, and have been validated and refined through several events, organizing by IWMI, that brought together agricultural extension agents, farmers, community volunteers, traders, borehole dealers and pump repairers, researchers, and others from within the region.

Kulendi stressed an urgent need to explore the region’s market potential. He mentioned that establishing a sales and distribution network is one way to make solar-powered pumps accessible to farmers:

“We have been trying to set up an office here in the Upper East since last year. We have not done it yet because we had not explored the potential, especially in irrigation. But with the potential that we have explored since we visited places in the region [with IWMI], I bet you by the end of the year, we will have a physical presence here. IWMI has created this opportunity to bring us together to interact with you. We would also like to encourage you to bring more of us together again to realize our potential,” he said.

While smallholder farmers in the Upper East region are potential customers for solar-powered pumps, their interest will depend on the ease of access, user-friendliness of pumps, whether the pumps meet their needs and preferences, and whether they are economically attractive investments. The multi-stakeholder dialogues meetings, which are expected to continue over the coming years, are valuable for private sector companies to interact with each other and others in the sector, to facilitate linkages between actors, strengthen information exchange, and stimulate innovation.

Market segmentation benefits go beyond business

For private sector businesses, market segmentation helps identifying needs and interests of various groups, such as the segments identified above as well as for example women, youth, and persons with disabilities. With better market segmentation, companies can save time, while reducing cost and effort, when attempting to reach new customers in target markets. In this way, market segmentation indirectly contributes to economic growth in the agricultural sector due to the increase in use of mechanized irrigation technologies.

What’s more, market segmentation can help governments, practitioners, and irrigation equipment suppliers design products specifically targeting women. Such gender-sensitive product design might consider the various water-related roles and schedules of women farmers and could imply designing pumps that are portable, light, and easy to use for multiple purposes. Women farmers prefer solar technology that can be used not only for pumping water for irrigation, but also for livestock watering, and domestic and household hygiene activities. A well-segmented market also makes clear the need to design products that are within the income levels of the target groups, such as women.

In this way, segmenting markets to target women specifically could benefit women in various ways. It might, for example, allow women to access solar-powered irrigation pumps that could improve on-farm production and income, contribute to nutrition security within the household, and reduce the time women spend on irrigation.

Finally, market segmentation could help government and non-governmental organizations plan interventions, allocate resources, facilitate impact assessments, promote inclusive development, and obtain insights that can lead to best-fit innovations and better services for all Ghanaians.

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The multi-stakeholder dialogue meeting in Ghana was third in a series of events convening stakeholders from the small scale irrigation sector to discuss challenges and collaborate on collective solutions. It was followed by a similar meeting in Ethiopia, which was held on May 27, 2021, and co-convened by the Ethiopian Ministry of Agriculture, the International Water Management Institute (IWMI), and 2030 Water Resources Group. Reports on both events will be published soon.

Boosting small scale irrigation in Mali by training vegetable seed producers

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by Jean-baptiste Tignegre and Pepijn Schreinemachers

Gaining access to more and better vegetable seeds represents an opportunity for smallholder farmers in Mali to grow high-value crops and improve their diets, incomes, and ability to adopt small scale irrigation technologies.

Small scale irrigation is expensive for many farmers in Mali and elsewhere. Smallholder farmers who produce staple food crops may not easily be able to make such an investment. Cultivating more profitable crops, such as vegetables, offers better prospects for eventually being able to invest in irrigation and improve farm incomes.

However, Malian farmers have limited opportunity to take up production of vegetables due to an under-developed seed sector in the country. Currently, vegetable seed production is often restricted to the wet season due to a lack of irrigation technologies, which is not the only constraint. Seed companies and cooperatives have low technical capacity in variety development and quality seed production, face difficulties in accessing finance, and lack suitable equipment for seed processing and packing. As a result, many vegetable farmers are using costly imported seed.

To strengthen local vegetable seed production, the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Small Scale Irrigation (ILSSI) and World Vegetable Center in Mali recently trained staff of vegetable seed companies and seed cooperatives on how to strengthen seed production.

The training was held at the World Vegetable Center Regional Office for West and Central Africa – Dry Regions in Samanko near Bamako on November 16–20, 2020. Twenty staff of fourteen different seed companies and cooperatives participated in the workshop. Participants came from diverse regions of Mali including Kayes, Sikasso, Koutiala, Koro, and Bamako.

World Vegetable Center’s Regional Director Dr. Mamadou Kabirou Ndiaye welcomed participants and described the opportunities and challenges of vegetable producers in Mali and West Africa, including limitations in accessing water for irrigation and an under-developed market.

The five-day training combined classroom teaching with hands-on sessions. Resource persons came from the World Vegetable Center and the Institute or Rural Economy. Topics included vegetable breeding, including different crossing methods, seed legislation, seed production methods, crop management, soil fertility management, pest management, and irrigated water management, including the pros and cons of different irrigation methods.

Participants said that they were very satisfied with the course and hoped for a future opportunity to receive follow-on training. Given the high interest among vegetable seed producers, a second course has been scheduled for March 22–26, 2021.

Understanding how small scale irrigation can grow big benefits in Mali

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For a long time, irrigation in Mali was generally equated with the publicly run Office du Niger that serves nearly 100,000 hectares of irrigated rice production in the central part of the country. However, in recent years, a small scale irrigation sector has been rapidly developing, and now is the time to ensure that small irrigators also get to grow big.

Overall, irrigators in Mali consume more nutrient-rich food groups than farmers relying on rain to water their crops, but how much more depends on various factors such as the type of irrigation technology used, the level of non-farm income, farmers’ literacy level and participation in farmer groups.

Moreover, although small scale irrigation is linked with higher production and income generation, small scale irrigators do not consume as much or as good food as farmers participating in larger irrigation schemes. This is likely due to small scale irrigators’ poorer market access, which means that even though their earnings increase, they have only limited opportunities to sell their own produce and buy what is needed for a more diversified diet.

As small scale irrigation expands in Mali, and across much of sub-Saharan Africa, identifying how more farmers can enjoy more benefits from irrigation is becoming increasingly important. On March 3 and March 10, 2021, the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Small-Scale Irrigation (ILSSI), with support from the USAID Bureau of Humanitarian Affairs, therefore held a national and a regional workshop in Bamako and Sikasso, respectively, to identify the best ways to accelerate expansion of small scale irrigation.

Workshop participants identify and map actors in small scale irrigation. Photo provided by Claudia Ringler/IFPRI.

Adoption of small scale irrigation, by its nature, is disjointed and involves many different actors: Farmers, the private sector, and the government, who do not all have access to the same information at the same time. This results, for example, in higher costs for farmers wanting access to technology, but also lower equipment sales for the private sector; this asymmetry of information slows down expansion.

Improving information flow and strengthening relationships can help remove some of these barriers. For example, supporting strong but poorly connected actors, such as the private sector, to gain insights into what producer groups and their farmer members are looking for in small scale irrigation technology—as well as what linkages these groups already have with research and suppliers—could help the private sector strengthen its sales of irrigation equipment.

As Abdoul Karim Diamoutene, workshop facilitator, noted summarizing his impressions, “A few participants in the recent national workshop suggested that they knew all possible actors that affect small scale irrigation diffusion in Mali, but at the end of the event they conceded that they were surprised about the diversity of influencers that can make a difference for the diffusion of technology.”

To identify actors that influence the diffusion of technologies and how these stakeholders interact with each other, the workshops used the Net-Map method, a facilitation or interview technique that helps people understand, visualize, discuss, and improve situations in which many different actors influence outcomes. Representatives from government, research, non-governmental organizations, donors, and the private sector participated in the deliberations.

Through the process, the national workshop identified 73 different actors who are linked to the diffusion of small scale irrigation, including a large number of government agencies, credit institutions, farmer associations, research institutions, non-governmental organizations, and donors. These results will be fed into software to create a map of who is driving expansion of small scale irrigation to support analysis of linkages and influence levels. A working paper will also be prepared building on this analysis and will be shared with stakeholders to support their decision-making.

With more knowledge in hand, farmer groups, cooperatives, private sector companies, and other influential actors will be able to identify entry points to intervene, remove blockages, and support important relationships, ultimately enabling the diffusion of affordable, good-quality technologies to farmers.

Webinar: Potential and options for irrigated fodder production shared with policymakers and practitioners in Ethiopia

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In a recent webinar, scientists presented Ethiopian policymakers and practitioners with promising findings on the potential for irrigated production of livestock fodder, which could help meet important income and nutrition gaps.

Dr. Gbola Adesogan, Professor and Director of the Feed the Future Livestock Systems Innovation Lab (LSIL), opened the webinar with remarks on how insufficient feed has been identified as main constraint to livestock production in Ethiopia.

“Our objective is to share results to inform decisions and shape further investments and research, ” he said. “It is very important to promote research to support policy and further funding for this topic, not only in Ethiopia, but across East and West Africa.”

The event, which took place on December 2, 2020, was organized by the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Small Scale Irrigation (ILSSI) with support from LSIL and in collaboration with the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI). More than 30 participants had accepted the invitation to join discussions, and they represented science institutions, development and donor organizations as well as ministries and other government offices.

The importance of the research presented was underscored by Dr. Yirgalem Gebremeskel, Livestock Program Management Specialist and Tech Advisor at USAID, which has funded the work:

“Despite having Africa’s largest livestock population, Ethiopia’s livestock sector has not reached its full potential, which can be attributed to many factors, high among them shortage of feed and low-quality feed.”

Webinar on irrigated fodder in Ethiopia: Suitability and potential

Download presentations by ILSSI scientists on irrigated fodder suitability and potential in Ethiopia.

Significant potential could be converted into big benefits

Through land suitability analysis, scientists from Texas A & M University have been able to identify areas across the country suitable for irrigated production of different types of fodder crops.

“As you can see the western part of the country is suitable for Napier grass production, while the eastern part is highly suitable for Alfalfa, ” said Dr. Abeyou Worqlul, scientist at Texas A & M. “The suitable areas have groundwater reserves that can be tapped via water-lifting technologies and be used for irrigation.”

In fact, Dr. Yihun Tadele, also of Texas A & M, explained that Ethiopia in general has a high amount of water resources that can be used for irrigation.

“But we need to use both green and blue water resources in an integrated manner,” he specified, referring to the blue water in rivers and aquifers, while green water is naturally infiltrated rain in soil.

Finally, Jean Claude Bizimana, Economist at Texas A & M, explained how modeling different scenarios – considering for example improved crossbred cow breeds – has provided a sense of the economic and nutritional potential of irrigated fodder production.

“Use of improved feed and breed can increase households’ nutritional status, but also their incomes,” he concluded.

Growing interest for brand-new intervention in the livestock sector

The research results on suitability and impacts have already been grounded in field trials, in which a growing number of farmers have seen very promising results, both in terms of the quality of fodder produced and the resulting increases in milk yields and incomes.

“Farmers were able to produce a high amount of forage biomass of good nutritional value from small plots,” explained Dr. Melkamu Derseh, Scientist, Livestock Feeds and Nutrition, at ILRI.

While the trials started out with just a few farmers, more have volunteered to join as the work progressed.

“Awareness has been created and interest is increasing. The demand for forage planting materials and irrigation technologies has also increased, especially for the newly introduced solar pumps,” he said.

Melkamu noted that barriers currently hampering broad scaling of irrigated fodder production include limited access to high-quality cow breeds and forage planting materials as well as the high price of irrigation technologies. ILSSI is working to overcome such barriers, including via partnerships with dairy cooperatives, which could start providing their members with forage seeds and thus provide an informal seed distribution system.

To wrap up discussions, Belete Bantero, Senior Transformation Agenda Specialist II at Ethiopian Agricultural Transformation Agency (ATA), offered his perspectives. He recalled the two year-drought that wrecked havoc in Ethiopia between 2016 and 2018.

“It caused the loss of over 30,000 livestock because of lack of livestock feed.” He went on to say that “this is interesting and really vital work – it’s very evidence based, it’s timely and it’s a brand new intervention, as we have not previously related the livestock sector with irrigation.”

ILSSI scientists and partners will continue efforts to scale up irrigated fodder production in Ethiopia, including through partnerships with dairy cooperatives and the private sector.

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