Water is an integral part of resilience and needs to be more visible in climate negotiations especially when it comes to its usage in agriculture in Sub Saharan Africa.

Climate change is experienced first and foremost through changes in water regimes such as extreme rainfall, floods and prolonged droughts especially by a large majority in the Global South who depend on climate exposed occupations like agriculture

Since the most vulnerable feel climate impacts through water, it also becomes the vehicle through which climate injustice propagates.

Water is a part of the problem, but also a part of the solution. Many of the adaptation measures involve use of water a case in point irrigation, soil moisture conservation, rainwater harvesting to improve livelihoods, reduce vulnerability and improve agriculture productivity.

Mitigation is the need of the hour, but if not well planned, some mitigation measures can make local water and food security worse through high water footprint. Water needs a seat at the mitigation table.

This is the call of climate change experts who are advocating for sufficient and appropriate water management in agriculture systems.

Background

Dr Aditi Mukheri from the Consortium of International Agriculture Research Centers (CGIAR) giving the background of the climate change assessment report detailing challenges of water shortage affecting the agriculture sector notes that all components of the water cycle have been affected by climate change.

Heavy precipitation, prolonged droughts, Floods, Melting of Cryosphere are some examples.

He notes that in the report experts observed changes in droughts since 1950s and Glaciers melting at unprecedented rates in all regions affecting culture and ways of lives of Indigenous peoples.

Looking at the agricultural sector it is stated that three thirds of global harvested land experienced drought agricultural losses between 1983 and 2009, with production loss of 9-10% due to weather extremes alone.

In as far as freshwater ecosystems is concerned, between 1970-2015, 35% of wetland area declined, with climate change being an important driver.

Mitigations measures

Experts suggest that water related adaptation is most effective up to 1.5 degrees Celsius and effectiveness decreases with increasing warming

Most Mitigation measures and Carbon Dioxide Removals approaches and technologies can have large trade-offs with water and food security.

Bio-energy crops such as maize, soy beans and sugar cane along with other nature based solutions can potentially limit global warming by the end of the 21st century to 1.5°C, but can potentially double the global area and population living under severe water stress compared to the current baseline.

Other mitigation measures are afforestation and re-forestation as popular tool of mitigation, with some very optimistic estimates saying additional 0.9 billion hectares of canopy cover in suitable locations could store 205 Gigatonne of carbon.

The global assessments on Forest and Water reiterated afforestation and reforestation should be concentrated in water abundant locations and where transpiration can potentially be captured downwind as precipitation

Water usage for agriculture

Valere Nzeyimana Senior Water Development and Management Officer Food and Agriculture Organization FAO Regional Office for Africa notes that globally agriculture accounts for 70% of water withdrawals.

Giving the statistical figure he explained that food production must increase significantly by 2050 to meet the demand of the world’s growing population and 60% of the extra food requirement in the future should come from irrigated agriculture.

In Africa, only 7% of arable land is irrigated, with an even lower 4% in sub-Saharan Africa and 93% of the African farmers rely on rain fed agriculture for their livelihoods.

He recommends that Agricultural growth is key to reducing poverty in Africa and driving economic development since the continent is endowed with water resources, yet water withdrawals are less than 3 percent of total renewable resources.

This therefore means that additional investment in agricultural water management would pay great dividends.

An integrated approach building water resilience in Sub-Saharan Africa

Communities are expected to establish knowledge based good practices on water development, conservation and management.

African governments are expected to establish appropriate infrastructure at appropriate level and harmonization of water related policies and strategies.

They are supposed to strengthen water users’ associations and water boards for proper water governance.

In the continent the maintenance of many large-scale irrigation schemes is no longer ensured by government money and some irrigation schemes have been abandoned.

The large irrigation schemes are now only viable if owned by private entities and small-scale irrigation schemes are the only option affordable and manageable by farmers or groups of farmers.

This is being the standard for many in African countries in terms of irrigation development.

Opportunities offered by FAO for farmers in Africa to the climate crisis

Dr Valere explained that improved water control and watershed management in a rain-fed environment is crucial.

Farmer led irrigation schemes using small scale irrigation technologies which are Solar Powered including water access technologies using underground storage including valley tanks and dams is another opportunity to grab.

Experts at FAO recommend that sustainable use of water resource requires holistic, integrated and concerted long term planning;

Available water technologies should be adapted to the local context and made affordable to users according to their socio economic situation.

All programs and projects should target multipurpose use of available water resource. It is in that sense that all programs should target the Improvement of the efficiency and diversity of water use and the productivity of agricultural systems for Food Security and Nutrition

All available sources of water should be considered even if it requires long term sensitization for mind-set change

Practical application in Uganda

In Uganda FAO has applied water challenge solving technologies in Central Uganda in the districts of Mubende and Nakasongola where valley dams and tanks have been constructed for the farming communities.

They communities have been sensitized to own water tanks set up by farmer groups under farmer field schools which they use mainly during dry season for growing vegetables and other crops such as beans and orange fruits that are grown in irrigated farms.

In the Karamoja region the same technologies have been applied where the farmers are using the valley tanks which are solar powered for crop production, and livestock farming.