BY TEWODROS KASSA
Ethiopia is endowed with ample water resources having 12 river basins with an annual runoff volume of 122 Billion m3 of water and an estimated 2.6-2.65 billion m3 of groundwater potential.
The country has enough access to surface water, groundwater, and rainwater. Its climate is also favorable to agriculture.
Besides, the country has vast fertile and irrigable land. Having these potentials at hand, the government is working strenuously to tap the irrigation potential.
Most importantly, the availability of adequate water supplies, arable land as well as government’s commitment to the sector and competitive manpower are among the opportunities to expand small, medium, and large-scale irrigation in the country.
Ministry of Agriculture Small Scale Irrigation Development Expansion Directorate Director Elias Awol told The Ethiopian Herald that the Ministry plans to irrigate more than 26,000 hectares of new arable land by this crop calendar. To achieve this, it is undertaking vast public mobilization activities.
There is a great commitment from the government and stakeholders to tap the irrigation potential and expand the ongoing smallholder farmers’ irrigation activities into medium and large-scale irrigation projects, according to the director.
“Currently, different irrigation farming projects are being undertaken countrywide via traditional and modern techniques and with the participation of the public and the private sectors.
The ministry is mobilizing the farmers and stakeholders to achieve the target of irrigating 26,000 hectares of land by the production season.”
Irrigation in Ethiopia is considered a basic strategy to alleviate poverty and ensure food security. It is useful to transform the rain-fed agricultural system into the combined rain-fed and irrigation agricultural system. Moreover, this is believed to be the most prominent way of achieving sustainable development in the country.
The country needs to develop small, medium, and large-scale irrigation farming to feed its rising population, which is second in Africa only next to Nigeria.
In addition to ensuring own consumption, undertaking extensive modern irrigation farming helps the country to produce exportable commodities that earn foreign exchanges and provide raw materials to the local industries.
Currently, most of the irrigation developments in the country are practiced through small-scale irrigation farming and hand-operating technologies. Therefore, expanding medium and large-scale irrigation farming developments assisted with the latest technologies is necessary to address the growing youth unemployment, Elias said.
Currently, farmers throughout the country are aware of the benefits of producing market-oriented fruits and vegetables as well as export-oriented cash crops through small-scale irrigation, he added.
As to him, farmers across the country also witness the tangible role of practicing irrigation to improve their way of life. Expanding sustainable irrigation mechanisms requires the determination of the practitioners assisted with competent sector researchers, agricultural extension workers, and increased stakeholders’ participation.
Promoting the latest technology-supported irrigation farming practice helps to transform and develop the pastoral states and areas that experience shortage of rainfall.
The Ministry is undertaking small-scale and mechanized irrigation development countrywide where the introduction of easily operational irrigation technologies like water pumping generators is also showing remarkable progress on the agricultural field.
As the country’s agriculture sector is transforming from a rain-fed agricultural system to a combined rain-fed and extensive irrigation-based farming scheme, the demand of the farmers for irrigation farming is also showing promising progress from time to time.
Thus, farmers have noticed tangible production and productivity increment while practicing irrigation in addition to the annual rain-based farming.
Compared to other countries, Ethiopia with huge water potential has not been benefiting adequately from irrigation agriculture. Researches in the area indicated that it is possible to irrigate more than 10.1 million hectares of land in Ethiopia.
Lack of adequate budget, irrigation technology, experience, and low private investors participation hinders the country not to cultivate and harvest the expected amount.
The country has set to cultivate more than 400,000 hectares of new arable land through irrigation farming. Currently, more than 800,000 hectares of land are being cultivated through irrigation annually.
Therefore, within ten years, more than 1.2 million hectares of land are expected to be cultivated through irrigation, the director indicated.
The Ethiopian Herald February 24/2021
