Scaling Up Productive Water

Evidence from seven years of experimentation and observation scaling micro-irrigation technology in some of the most difficult markets.

Eighty percent of the world’s poor population engage in agriculture for their livelihoods, most of them on plots of land as small as a half-acre. For over three decades, iDE has been creating business opportunities that disseminate resource-smart technology to enable these smallholder farmers to increase their incomes, grow their businesses, and improve their lives.

Irrigation technology, and supporting equipment and services, provides the key to increasing farm production while reducing the impact on the natural environment. From 2009 through 2016, iDE and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) explored how to expand irrigation for small-scale farmers through the practical application of various business models in Central America, Africa, and Asia. This website captures some of the lessons learned in addressing the challenges we encountered, as well as laying out a plan for the future.

Specific insights from the project include:

• When technology is designed to meet the needs of smallholders, they will invest in it. Drip irrigation packages were being offered at the smallest size (i.e., for home garden plots) and the largest (2,000 square meters), with nothing in between. Farmers need size and price options that meet their specific needs, and further product reconfiguration, research, and development needs to occur.
  
  

• The supply chain has to be in place in order for sales to scale. Challenges to meeting supply, such as tariffs, logistics, and local retailer commitment, can be addressed through example, engagement, and expertise of businesses interested in making an impact.
  
  

• Equipment alone is not the answer. Micro-irrigation requires technical support if it is to be successful. To do so, services should be bundled with each sale.
  
  

• The market potential for corporations to meet the needs of smallholders is billions of dollars. But to unlock that potential requires a substantial investment in reducing the barriers to entry that include distribution costs, market research, access to finance, and technical support.
  
  

• Farmers are reluctant to invest in expanding their production if they have no idea where to sell the increased harvest. By combining equipment sales with produce purchase guarantees in an outgrower model, farmers are more willing to try something new.
  
  

• Because of the challenges in scaling technical sales and service (and thus, achieving cost reductions), governments and bilaterals have a role in developing policy and technical assistance that can help the private sector overcome these hurdles. Microfinance and smart subsidies can help “prime the pump” of the irrigation market.

Solving the market development challenges that have neglected smallholder farmers is an ambitious endeavor that will take decades. Nor is there one, single solution that is a “magic bullet” for the problem. Much of our recent research has provided us new understanding in why something did or didn’t work. Fixing the supply chain, market failures, and knowledge gaps that underlie smallholder agriculture is a long-term mission, however, one that iDE remains committed to.

Within this seven-year timeframe, we were able to accelerate the development of productive applications of drip for small producers in Nicaragua, and introduce newer smallholder drip solutions in Burkina, Honduras, Kygyzstan and Tajikistan. Innovations that are showing progress include our Farm Business Advisor model that resolves last mile distribution and integrated service needs, recent developments with micro-irrigation manufacturers that are bringing options to the market such as solar pumps and varying sizes of drip kits, and the creation of social enterprise to fill the market gap where margins are so thin that it is unattractive for private businesses.

We welcome your feedback. Contact us at agriculture@ideglobal.org.