Bringing land back into Use
World Vision Operations Director, Kevin Mackey, South-Central Operations Manager, Napoleon Phiri, Livelihood South-Central Technical Specialist, Andrew Mugobo and implementing partner Rebuild Initiative Organization (RIO) paid a visit to Surgdud, Gedo- located 10 kilometers from Dolow, along the road to Mandera, Kenya. The team met with Barre Hassan Arab, Chairman of the Surgdud Village, Abdishakur Mohamed Haji, Livestock Outreach Worker, and other committee members to find out how the OFDA WHALES project had helped them improve farming in their community.
Background
In 2012 to 2013, thanks to funding from OFDA Emergency Support for Drought Affected IDPs and Host Communities, WV and implementing partner Community Activity for Relief & Development Organization (CAFDARO) targeted Surgdud riverine farmers, providing seeds, building a cased cannel and providing a pump to help improve their existing irrigation scheme. In this latest phase of OFDA WHALES, WV and RIO targeted the approaches to the rivers, degraded areas not under cultivation in the hope of extending the amount of land brought under production.
Land Regeneration Success
Chairman Barre Hassan recounted that 19 years ago, the target site had once been farming land. However, as this land lies on the approach to the river Dawa, and receives high levels of run-off from the surrounding countryside, which erodes the top soil, it has been stripped of nutrients. Over the years, the field had been overrun by Prosopis Juliflora, an invasive species of shrub that thrives in barren soils but is hard to remove and is of limited value to farmers and pastoralists.
After consultation with the RIO technical team, the community targeted this piece of land for land regeneration activities, first clearing the land of Prosopis Juliflora, and later constructing about 500 meter check dam using Cash for Work. The community were skeptical of building the check dam at first, not realizing how it could impact the water flow and contribute to land regeneration. However, after the first rains, community members saw how effective this simple technology was at slowing the velocity of water, capturing it, and improving its filtration in the soil.
Upon seeing the field full of water, the community quickly mobilized seeds from their own resources and planted their first pilot field, a crop consisting of sorghum, and cowpeas. The rain performance in Surgdud this year has been mixed, and their pilot crop has had only modest rain. As such, the community does not anticipate a huge sorghum grain harvest, however, they hope it will grow sufficiently to provide fodder for their animals in the lean time.
The Community Chairman noted that though the crop might not come in this year (mainly due to late planting as they sourced for seed), now, they have confidence for next growing season and will be prepared before the rains to take full advantage of the first rains for their new productive field. He also mentioned that community members from all over have been coming to see the field and he expects that others will be trying this new approach in the year ahead.
He gave a Somali proverb to describe how the community has embraced the new technology and the promise it has for bringing new fields under cultivation, “If you are going to take a bath, you must commit to getting your whole body wet.” Read, if you are going to make the investment of clearing the land and building a check dam, you need to plant the fields and bring the land back into use.
World Vision Sustainable, Integrated Approach
During the same trip, the field teams visited Surgdud riverine farm site to monitor the sustainability of an irrigation scheme undertaken in the previous OFDA grant: Emergency Support for Drought Affected IDPs and Host Communities 2012-2013. The World Vision team wanted to see how the community was maintaining their irrigation scheme. The team observed that the pump and irrigation channel were in working order and that the community had hired a tractor to help in the preparation of the field. Employing a tractor to increase the amount of land under cultivation is a clear sign that the community of Surgdud is leveraging the modest infrastructure investment made under the previous OFDA grant to help improve the food security of their families this year.
The monitoring team also visited the Dolow Primary School where in 2012-2013, through the OFDA supported project, WV and Somali Humanitarian Relief Action (SHRA) had rehabilitated a shallow well and established a pump. The well was in good working order. Moreover, World Vision, with funds from ADH Germany, has in 2015, constructed a latrine block and hand washing facilities. Water from the OFDA constructed well is being used at the toilet block and hand washing station, helping to improve hygiene and sanitation at the school facility. These complementary activities are helping improve the hygiene situation for 180 girls and 220 boys. Leveraging multiple donors within specific geographic locations is how World Vision integrates emergency and rehabilitative activities to create developmental outcomes.