Our experience

The A4Labs (Arid African Alluvial Aquifers Laboratories) action research initiative explored the potential and pitfalls of introducing solutions designed for individual smallholder farming families.[1] Pilots were established in the Limpopo river basin in Zimbabwe and Mozambique (for a 2 minute video see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-jooLBWqXI), and in the Tekeze river basin in northern Ethiopia.

The pilots entail innovation in three domains: the technology used (manually-installed shallow well-points in or next to a sand river combined with solar-powered water pumps), the arrangement (individual smallholder farming families), and the purpose (market-oriented farming).[2] This package provided smallholder farming families access to this nature-based water storage for food and cash crop production to make their livelihoods resilient in the face of climate variability and change. The package consisted of a hand-drilled well point, solar pump, irrigation system and agricultural inputs for less than US$ 1,000, allowing a smallholder farming family to start irrigating about half an acre.

Successful adoption of the approach was not constrained by water availability. Despite the fact that these pilots were established during two subsequent drought years, farmers did not experience any difficulty in accessing freshwater in sufficient quantity. Successful adoption appears to depend on previous farming experience, market access, and the possibility to grow adaptively in terms of technology, scale and financial risks. In addition, establishing an individual farm to grow cash crops requires acceptance and new skills, as irrigation for smallholder farmers in Africa has traditionally been framed as a communal activity in “collective” irrigation schemes with strong support by outside agencies, and with the well-known collective action challenges. The A4Labs action research has also estimated that the potential for upscaling this innovation in the Limpopo river basin is significant.

Monitoring and assessment are ongoing, but preliminary data from Mozambique indicate that despite a large variation in profit from agricultural production, average net profits may be in the range of US$ 100 – 500 per 2,000 m2 per season (whereby labour of the farming family is included as costs).


Dona Anita attending her plot along the Limpopo river near Chókwè, Mozambique

[1] https://a4labs.un-ihe.org; see also our NaBWIG – Nature based water infrastructures in Ethiopia and Kenya for #GlobalGoals project – http://www.nabwig.com

[2] Duker et al., 2020, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envsci.2020.02.010 [open access]