Only recently has farmer-led irrigation development (FLID) attracted increased attention from government institutions, donors and development organizations. FLID can help transform food systems by enhancing climate resilience, increasing and diversifying agricultural production, reducing poverty and supporting youth and women’s empowerment. Yet, despite its vast potential, FLID has only been expanding slowly. Barriers to it include inadequate policy and legal frameworks, underdeveloped irrigation technology and supply chains, a lack of affordable finance and limited access to input and output markets. Catalyzing FLID expansion at scale in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) in the next five to 10 years will require sustainable and inclusive strategies and joint efforts to address the barriers and gaps, as well as seize the opportunities present across the business, implementation and research spaces.
To develop such strategies and stimulate joint efforts, a conference titled “Investing in Farmer-led Irrigation Development in Sub-Saharan Africa: Business, Development and Research Practices” was organized, bringing together about 90 participants and 40 online attendees from the public and private sectors, research institutions and stakeholder groups, such as donors and farmers. Hosted by the International Water Management Institute (IWMI), the event was jointly sponsored by the USAID-funded Innovation Lab for Small Scale Irrigation (ILSSI), the CGIAR Initiative on West and Central African Food Systems Transformation (TAFS-WCA), the World Bank and Water and Energy for Food (WE4F). The conference provided an opportunity to share knowledge and experience, discuss the lessons learned on catalyzing FLID at scale, and exchange deep dives on topics covering water and environmental sustainability, innovation, inclusion, investment and financing, and capacity strengthening among implementers, investors, innovators, farmers and researchers.
The conference highlighted several key messages. While political and economic stability and a supportive policy framework are incentives, de-risking and harnessing FLID investments is essential to instituting contextually relevant innovation bundles, digital solutions, inclusive financing, partnerships, cross-sectoral learning, institutional capacity strengthening and gender and youth inclusion. Catalyzing resilient, inclusive and sustainable FLID in SSA takes multiple pathways (see the figure above). Joint efforts by stakeholders and actors in the FLID system are key, as each has unique roles and resources to tap the significant and transformational potential in SSA, in which FLID can be the game-changer in terms of agri-food systems transformation, food security and climate change resilience.
Developing and catalyzing innovation bundles put together innovations, services and practices to make context-specific FLID solutions available to farmers. Such bundles should be relevant to specific contexts and needs, and must be accessible and affordable to farmers and their communities; therefore, co-designing, co-developing and co-bundling are vital principles that make the bundles cost-effective, are built on farmer experiences and leverage existing government, extension, farmer, private sector and other value-chain actor networks. One example is solar-powered irrigation bundles. Technologies such as solar-powered irrigation pumps may serve as a core innovation that can be bundled with, for example, water conveyance, storage and application equipment, soil moisture monitoring sensors, PAYGO/PAYOWN financial services, other agricultural inputs and good agricultural practices (GAPs). When catalyzing these bundles at a large scale, bundling tools and digital innovations for land and water resource mapping, climate information services and advisory, and targeting investment decisions is necessary to achieve sustainability and inclusion.
Unlocking the enabling environment works to improve the policy and business environments to incentivize FLID to realize its potential. Policies on tax exemption, simplified import processes, irrigation development, clean energy for guiding interventions and enhancing private sector participation should be set up and enforced to attract private sector investors to import and locally manufacture irrigation equipment at affordable prices. Where policies exist, relevant institutions must be resourced to implement irrigation regulations and interventions to catalyze FLID while supporting the private sector to thrive. Capacity development is done through training local technicians to design, repair, and maintain the irrigation infrastructure and fostering cross-learning among SSA governments to improve synergies. State institutions with adequate funding, training and logistics will monitor groundwater use and other resources to ensure sustainability. Facilitating multistakeholder engagement and dialogues is needed for capacity building, interactive learning and sustainable and inclusive FILD investments at a large scale.
Operationalizing each pathway requires joint efforts from various actors. Agripreneurs such as farmers, agribusiness entities and other value-chain actors are the champions in developing and catalyzing innovation bundles and innovative and adaptive investment. Public institutions, private commercial and impact investors, and financial institutions foster scaling partnerships and collaboration and enable gender and youth inclusion. The government, research and knowledge partners, and nongovernmental organizations enable brokering knowledge for sustainability, enhancing capacity for system transformation and unlocking the enabling environment.
For inclusive and transformative scaling of FLID, multiple stakeholders’ and actors’ participation and ownership are needed to enhance their commitment and accountability. Flexibility and adaptability are key to adapting well to real circumstances and flexibly dealing with changes and particular conditions. Partnership and co-investment are essential to ensure that sufficient resources can be mobilized and leveraged from the private and public sectors and development partners to ensure long-term investment for catalyzing FLID. Finally, interactive learning and institutional capacity strengthening are critical to continual improvement in processes and support to FLID.