On Thursday 19th November 2020, Scene Connect hosted a half-day video conferencing event to explore strategies for improving irrigation for small-scale farmers in East Africa. The event was attended by 40 practitioners from a broad range of sectors related to agriculture, including smart irrigation technology manufacturers, financing organisations, charities, and university research programmes. The conference was structured to address three particular research questions:
How can the irrigation needs of small-scale farmers in East Africa be addressed through solar irrigation systems?
How can ‘smart’ technology solutions improve irrigation efficiency for small-scale farmers?
How can the benefits of small-scale irrigation solutions be delivered in a fair and equitable way?
The conference represented the culmination of REFRUIT. This agri-tech project – ‘Resource Efficient Farming by Renewable Ugandan Irrigation Technology’ – was funded between June 2019 and December 2020 by the UK Government’s Innovate UK department. As already described in a previous blog post – ‘Preparing to harvest the sunshine’ - REFRUIT investigated the barriers to irrigation uptake for small-scale farmers in Northern Uganda. A total of 8 pilot trials were conducted across a wet and dry season with small-scale farmers, assessing the impact of a solar integrated precision irrigation pump (IPIP-S) developed by technology partners Farm-Hand and Futurepump.
Farmers who took part in the REFRUIT precision solar water pump pilot trials saw their crop yields, incomes, and food security improve, alongside significant reductions in labour requirements.
Conference Review
The conference combined plenary presentations with a series of participatory ‘breakout rooms’, in which the conference participants were divided into groups and invited to share thoughts and experiences around a particular topic. Following an introduction from Scene’s Research Manager Sandy Robinson, Permanent Secretary at the Ugandan Ministry of Water & Environment Alfred Okot Okidi gave the Keynote presentation, focusing on Uganda’s vast surface water irrigation potential and the Ugandan government’s ongoing programmes to deliver small scale irrigation products and services.
In Session 1, Helen Davies at Futurepump discussed how they work with its network of in-country distributors to improve affordability and access to their portable surface water pumps for rural small-scale farmers. Anastasia Mbuti, Technical Manager at Farm Africa, then presented a case study of their work in Tigray, Ethiopia. The organisation trialled a wide range of irrigation technologies across groups and individuals. Despite encountering initial local resistance, the project eventually yielded very positive outcomes for crop yield and income.
Session 2 was led by Farm-Hand CEO, Abhi Bhargava, who presented how his company are using remote farm surveying, precision irrigation solutions and machine learning to provide bespoke irrigation solutions for small-scale farmers and solar pump distributors to improve irrigation uptake and access in rural East Africa.
Session 3 explored the context of northern Uganda, featuring presentations from Agricultural Extension Officer Alex Maguma, and Gulu Agricultural Development Company’s Jennifer Angee. Their presentations reflected on the social inclusivity of irrigation extension programmes, and how cooperative farm groups in particular can help to address some of the social and financial barriers to access and benefit from irrigation technology solutions.
Discussion
Many of the conference participants engaged actively during the breakout room sessions, and asked questions to the plenary speakers via the live chat box function. Breakout Session 1 explored the most significant barriers to improved irrigation uptake and access for small-scale farmers, with participants in general agreement that poor access to the appropriate sorts of finance was one of the greatest challenges. The topic of responsibility was also addressed – which stakeholder(s) should ensure that farmers have the financial means and knowledge to access such technologies? To this, Futurepump suggested that technology manufacturers should incorporate financing options directly within the sales model, while another participant proposed that consultants and researchers be responsible for bridging technology developers, financiers, and distributors across the whole supply chain.
Breakout Session 2 was concerned with the use and value of ‘smart’ technologies to improve irrigation access and efficient water delivery for small-scale farmers. First focussing on the smart technologies which participants were aware of, some reflected that often only basic mobile phones were used to share farm information among farmers and agricultural organisations. The use of mobile money, for example via the M-PESA platform, was also suggested as a well-known mobile technology used by farmers, and a representative from The Farmer’s Guide Uganda proposed it as a way to address the financial and accessibility challenges of smart technology for the rural poor: with mobile phones becoming more affordable, low-risk, simple interface pay-as-you-go (PAYG) business models could help improve inclusivity for low-income customers.
Breakout Session 3 focused on the inclusive delivery of irrigation solutions and provided some of the most passionate discussions during the conference. Participants highlighted issues surrounding land tenure and fragmentation in Uganda as a key barrier to the equal distribution of benefits. This included the insecurity of tenure of small-scale farmers who often rent land on both formal and informal basis. Furthermore, participants highlighted the challenges in understanding and describing gender politics, as different countries, regions, towns, and villages have different social landscapes and varying levels of equality. A key theme in delivering equality in irrigation improvements was around greater support for women, with several experienced participants highlighting the need for family unit ownership of irrigation assets and training to enable women to play a more central role in the farm business.
Further information
If you are interested in further information about any of the projects, organisations or participants mentioned in the conference, you can find the relevant links below, including a YouTube playlist which contains recordings of the conference proceedings.
Scene Connect - https://scene.community/
Farm-Hand - https://www.farm-hand.in/
Futurepump - https://futurepump.com/
GADC - https://gadc.co.ug/
Innovate UK - https://www.ukri.org/
YouTube playlist of conference recordings:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLtaTPZ0THGsKGBhnOpg3gQ9LhQJ3V2prY
If you require further information, or would like to talk to the project team, then please get in touch with Dominic (Conference Coordinator), at dom.s@scene.community.