Director of Irrigation Services (DIS) Mr. Geoffrey Mwepa says his department is making sure that irrigation infrastructure that the department is putting up in the country should be managed with an eye for commercial farming.
“Managing irrigation infrastructure just for food security is a thing of the past. What we are looking at right now is that we should be able to operate on a commercial basis, so that we can get good returns to justify the investments we have made in irrigation infrastructure,” says Mwepa.
He was speaking in Lilongwe in an interview with team of journalists working a documentary on irrigation farming in the country.
On utilization of schemes constructed under PRIDE, the director described utilization of most of the schemes as “work in progress” expressing hope that things will improve as time progresses.
“In the first season, utilization was not that good but with time we are improving. And at the moment, we have a strategy that we want to use to make sure that farmers in PRIDE schemes and all other schemes are fully utilizing the schemes. We should be able to have them on full utilization,” added the director.
Six irrigation schemes, constructed under PRIDE are currently being utilized. The schemes are: Mlooka and Matoponi in Zomba, Marko and Mafinga in Chitipa, Wowo in Phalombe and Lingoni in Machinga.
Mwepa cited challenges with access to input on the part of the farmers as one of the major contributing factors to low utilization of the schemes. He however explained that measures are being put in place to increase utilization of the schemes.
We are putting in place modalities on how best farmers could access the inputs to make sure that they utilize the schemes effectively. He however cited some schemes that registered immediately maximum utilization and expressed hope that similar success stories once construction is completed.
“We have instances where from season number one after construction, farmers have utilized the schemes one hundred percent like Linga irrigation scheme in Nkhata Bay. We therefore feel that the same could be replicated to other schemes including the schemes under PRIDE,” said Mwepa.
Currently PRIDE is constructing three schemes namely: Dowa-Dambo in Dowa district, Chipofya in Rumphi, and Mzenga in Nkhata Bay district.
The director expressed joy over the impact that irrigation farming is making on the livelihoods of rural Malawians. He cited various assets that the farmers are able to acquire once they start utilizing irrigation infrastructures that are being put in place.
“We have stories of the way these farmers have had their livelihoods improved. It is encouraging that others have managed to access services that they were not bale to access before they started irrigation farming. They have assets that they have never had before. So irrigation farming is transforming the well-being of rural communities,” added Mwepa.
He expressed hope that with continued investment in irrigation, Malawi should reach an area where irrigation contribution to the food basket should be bigger than the current situation.