Irrigation scheme farmers expect K2.5bn in earnings
Rice farmers surrounding the Likangala Irrigation Scheme, the largest in Zomba District, are optimistic about earning at least K2.5 billion despite perennial climate shocks.
Scheme president Lloyd Taibu said 1 947 farmers from 11 villages earned over K2.2 billion last year after selling 2 460 metric tonnes of aromatic Kilombero rice from the 410-hectare paddy.
“Having made over K2 billion in the wake of Cyclone Freddy, we hope to generate over K2.5 billion this year. Our crop looks healthy despite the dry spells caused by the El Nino weather pattern across southern Africa,” he told Minister of Agriculture Sam Kawale.
On Saturday, the minister visited the scheme, constructed in 1969.
He toured a newly constructed 6.18-kilometre (km) dyke that protects crops and neighbouring villages from the flood-prone Likangala River.
The project, funded by the World Bank through the Malawi Resilience and Disaster Risk Management Project (MRDRMP), also included strengthening the lining of a 5.2km canal, construction of flood protection bunds along the flood-prone river and gravelling a 5.2km access road that splits the scheme.
Likangala is one of the country’s oldest schemes alongside Wovwe and Hara in Karonga, Lifuwu in Salima and Domasi in Zomba.
Kawale rallied growers to embrace irrigation farming, guaranteeing the nation at least two harvests yearly as rain-fed crops keep failing due to climate change.
He urged irrigation farmers to spare some money for rehabilitating schemes, their main source of income and livelihoods.
The modernisation of the Likangala scheme started in 2010 when the World Bank-funded Irrigation, Rural Livelihoods and Agricultural Development (Irlad) Project supported the restoration of rundown facilities and the introduction of high-yielding cropping.
In 2018, MRDRP supported the construction of a spillway, 5.2km canal lining and flood protection bunds along the river, which flows year-round.
The works spanned a tragic half-decade in which Likangala and dozens of irrigation schemes across the Southern Region were ripped by Cyclone Idai in 2019, Ana and Gombe in 2022 and Freddy last year.
The minister said it is pleasing that farmers are getting billions and buying vital assets such as livestock, decent houses, motor vehicles and motorcycles from the proceeds of irrigation.
To him, this symbolises the untapped wealth farmers stand to gain if they embrace irrigation farming beyond the Megafarms and Agriculture Commercialisation projects.
The farmers and Zomba Likangala legislator Abigail Bongwe asked the government to improve the road network and revamp the Agricultural Development and Marketing Corporation to improve access to lucrative markets.
