By BUUMBA CHIMBULU
SMALL-SCALE irrigation agriculture is important for sustainable food production in Zambia and should therefore to be considered as part of the overall package to building resilient systems amid Covid-19.
This calls for increased investment and national budget allocations towards the development and promotion of small-scale irrigation agriculture backed by direct rural infrastructure development such as roads, electricity, and stable organised markets, among others.
This is according to the Centre for Trade Policy and Development (CTPD)-Trade and Development Researcher, Emmanuel Muma.
Mr Muma said a CTPD research on irrigation agriculture and small-scale famers’ productivity, showed that Zambia had a huge potential for irrigation agriculture.
“While irrigation can possibly boost agriculture production yields by at least 50 percent, Zambia’s food crops are grown almost exclusively using rain fed methods by small scale farmers, majority of whom are in rural areas and farm less than two hectares of land.
“Small scale farmers have very little infrastructure for water collection and lack adequate irrigation systems to support all year-round agriculture production,” he said in a statement.
CTPD, Mr Muma said, believed that Irrigation development in Zambia’s agriculture sector was critically important to ensure sustained production and productivity among small scale farmers necessary for the nation to attain sustainable national food security and poverty reduction.
He stressed that it was important for Government of the day and the aspiring political parties for the 2021 general elections to ensure that irrigation agriculture for small scale farmers was prioritised in their development agendas. “CTPD’s learning experience from the neighboring country Tanzania, and anecdotal data reviews the significance and benefits of successful irrigation development.
“Although the improvement of irrigation schemes is part of a broader government strategy to increase food productivity and security for small scale farmers in Tanzania, to the ordinary men and women in the remote villages, government support toward irrigation development signifies more than just increased yields,” Mr Muma said.
