BY EDWARD OJULU
Only about two months ago, heavy rains
pounded the East African region with intensity and in some places even caused
flooding.
Here in Rwanda, floods swept away homes,
crops and temporarily displaced hundreds of people in low altitude areas. There
were even two or so deaths reported to have occurred as a result of mudslide on
one of the hills near Kigali.
That was between April and May. Suddenly, the
rains have stopped just as farmers get down to do some work. Officials of the
meteorology department say forecasts show that there is no more rain expected
this season. This means that the dry season has come earlier than expected. Yet
the first season rains came extremely late. What does this mean to our rain-fed
agriculture and food security in general? Indeed as the English say; your guess
is as good as mine. There is a real possibility of hunger in the region.
First of all, the brief rains came after
about five months of extremely dry weather that in some areas forced
pastoralists to migrate in search of water for their animals. In 2009 the
entire cattle, goat and sheep population was almost wiped out in north-western
Kenya following a devastating drought that lasted over a year.
Global warming presents two extreme weather
conditions--very wet and extremely hot which call for careful planning in order
to strike a balance.
One such solution is investing in research
and development of early maturing crops. If rains come and go in just two
months, it is a waste of time and energy to plant maize varieties that mature
after 90 days unless other contingency measures such as irrigation are put in
place.
It is equally time wasting to let farmers
continue planting traditional crops grown by their fore fathers decades ago
when the land was still virgin and rainfall still reliable and predictable.
We must also consider investing more in
irrigation and water harvesting technology. Just two months ago, as this year's
belated main rain season started, seasonal rivers in parts of Rwanda and
western Uganda sprung to life. We watched while that water kept flowing allover
while some evaporated into the atmosphere. Yet farmers are now faced with the
possibility of real crop failure just a few weeks to mature. It is no longer
acceptable in this age and era for farmers to watch as maize the needed only
two more weeks of rain (water) to dry when a month earlier there was plenty of
it flowing around.
There has been a lot of talk about global
warming and how to mitigate its effects. Several international conferences have
been convened but no concrete action has been taken to deal with this
phenomenon. The real challenge, as things appear now, is in striking a balance
between these two extreme weather conditions--plenty of water and severe
drought.
In East Africa we are all talking about
transforming our agriculture from peasant to modern and commercial farming.
This is rightly so considering that farming is the source of livelihood for a
majority of east Africans. But it is doubtful if those who depend on farming as
well policy makers fully appreciate the core aspects of modern farming. Often,
modernization of agriculture has been viewed within the lens of use of modern
tools of cultivating the land and harvesting; planting improved seeds and
appropriation of large chunks of land for large-scale production. And
scientists have indeed done a wonderful job of producing improved varieties of
cereal such as rice and maize, roots crops such as cassava and potatoes as well
as fruits and vegetables.
Despite these innovations, productivity
remains low and famine looms large because the most important component of
modern farming--provision of adequate water--has not yet been tackled. Our
agriculture almost entirely remains rain-fed.
Rwanda is currently making an effort in this
direction with more acreage now under irrigation. In the 2012/13 budget
estimates presented to parliament two weeks ago, the minister of finance, John
Rwangombwa promised even more funding to expand irrigation schemes in the
country under the Water-Harvesting and Hillside Irrigation project. It is only
when farmers are able to produce through out the year, without having to depend
on rain, that we can guarantee food security for all.
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