Innovations in water management for agriculture: New pathways, future challenges

Alan Nicol, Sustainable Growth Program Lead, IWMI Addis Ababa

The wider challenge: stresses, pressures & opportunities – Looking back…We need to produce 60% more food by 2050. In 2007 the challenge was well-stated in the Comprehensive Assessment (Molden, et al):

“The lack of water is thus a constraint to producing food for hundreds of millions of people. Agriculture is central in meeting this challenge because the production of food and other agricultural products takes 70% of the freshwater withdrawals from rivers and groundwater. Greater competition raises questions: Who will get the water, and how will allocations be decided? Conflict will grow between pastoralists and herders, between farms and cities, between those upstream and those downstream.”

Smallholder farming: Managing agricultural water availability, access and use is key to success

Smallholder farmers are increasingly initiating and financing small-scale land and water management technologies themselves, but there are barriers:

• In India > 50% of the irrigated area watered by smallholder pumps.• In much of Africa, smallholder AWM reaches more farmers than public irrigation.• Lack of available investment opportunities, rising uncertainty and risk (climate,

trade-offs amid competing demands)• How to manage the ‘publicness vs. privateness’ of risk?

Farmers’ reliance on different types of irrigation in Ghana

What does this mean in practice? New pathways

Source: Adapted from Giordano et al. 2012

Blending key technical innovations and developments…

…with investments in gender equity and wider social inclusion

Photo credit: One Acre Fund

The context• India has 130,000 GW of installed

pumping capacity in the form of electric and diesel tube wells

• States subsidize solar pumps as “green solution”

Solution: Solar Pump Irrigation Cooperative

• Sustainable solar irrigation pumps with feed-in tariff for selling excess electricity to the grid

• Reduction in greenhouse gas emissions

• Sustainable use of groundwater

• Higher incomes for farmers

Improving productivity and livelihoods

through smart solar irrigation

The challenge

• Solar pump subsidies could incentivize over-pumping

Pathway 1: Solar energy to strengthen access to water for agriculture: India

Before energy sales After energy sales

Improving productivity and livelihoods

through smart solar irrigation

Pathway 1: Solar energy to strengthen access to water for agriculture: Ethiopia

The context and opportunity

• Mostly rainfed, smallholder farming

• 14% of population connected to the electricity grid

• Significant potential for solar pumps (~7 M ha) to offer climate smart, supplemental irrigation

• Demand is high; traction with public and donor supported programs.

• Potential business scenarios for positive returns on investment

The challenges• Regulatory: difficult to access information/incentives

• Value chain: underdeveloped for irrigation/solar energy

• Rural financing: low capacity, limited access

• Capacity: limited on technology installation and repairs

Pathway 2: Increasing water availability: rainwater harvesting (Dewas District, Madhya Pradesh)

The context and opportunity

• Rapid expansion in irrigation area (from 1970s)

• Large dependency on groundwater

The challenges

• Natural rate of groundwater recharge low

• Significant declines in groundwater levels

Solution: Individual RWH Structures

• Wet and dry season farming now possible.

• Cropping intensity increased (122% to 198%)

• Increased incomes (>70%)

• Multiple use options

• Reduction in groundwater and electricity use

• Payback period: 3 years

• Financial B/C ratio: 1.5-1.9

Pathway 3: Improving usage – Wetting Front indicators in Ethiopia

The Challenges

• Furrow irrigation and water intervals leading to under and over irrigation

• Low water productivity, leaching, soil structure damage, etc

• Conflict over water access

The opportunities

• LIVES project support for irrigation scheduling improvements through ‘wetting front’ technology in Koga, West Gojjam

• Opportunity developed in Australia to support better judgment on water provision to crops during critical growing periods

Pathway 4: Understanding scale: Food security monitoring and hazard risk mapping

• IWMI’s South Asia Drought Monitor provides analysts, governments, and aid organizations with insight on agricultural lands, cultivated areas, crop health, and crop diversity.

• Accurate maps and ongoing, actionable information help realize increasing levels of food production and ensure those foods are diverse and nutritious.

• Timely, reliable information will help aid agencies, governments, and the private sector collaborate on solutions to ensure food and nutrition security.

http://dms.iwmi.org

IBFI Concept

http://ibfi.iwmi.org/

• Index insurance can affordably protect

small farmers against losses from climate

Shocks

• Index insurance complements proactive

risk management activities (such as

water storage) to maximize farmers’

resilience.

• IWMI is partnering with the private sector,

universities, and local organizations to

pilot innovative index insurance that has

helped hundreds of farmers and

pastoralists cope with extreme weather

SNA

PSH

OT

• India’s first index based flood insurance successfully

implemented covering 200household in Muzaffarpur

district, Bihar

• Implementation of post flood management plan using flood

parameters (depth and duration) derived from satellite data

for agriculture development in India;

• As climate change makes weather shocks such as

droughts more frequent and more intense, index insurance

can help smallholder farmers and herders reduce their

vulnerability and protect their assets.

4.1 Going beyond risk transfer through Index-Based Flood Insurance (IBFI)

Opportunities

• Combining ‘big data’ and local interventions

• Improved water management can improve quality, increase yield, increase profits

• Women perceive tools as a way to improve labor use – buidling gender inclusivity and empowerment at all levels enhances value and supports sustainability

• Establishing new systematic thinking on water for smallholder farmers; selling a ‘packaged idea’ akin to WASH

• Building a global movement…

Challenges

• Creating the momentum for change

• Enhancing investments and establishing benefits

• Melding public information, policy dialogue with practicel support measures

Ways forward – Blending ‘water-smart’ and climate-smart agriculture…

Managing water to avoid risk, reduce

variability and enhance opportunities

Establishing greater resilience to shocks, building more robust production systems

Blending rain-fed and irrigated farming approaches according to agro-ecologies, market opportunities and conditions for social and institutional sustainability