Groundwater for Poverty

"Eighty-five percent of Africa’s poor live in rural areas and mostly depend on agriculture for their livelihoods" (You et al. 2010: v). 

With such a high proportion of Africa's population depending upon agriculture for their income, it seems sensible that they should be provided with the opportunity to exploit and excel in this market. With rain-fed agriculture and irrigation proving climate-dependent (see previous blog post: 'Groundwater's climate resilience'), Groundwater holds the potential to not only increase the amount of land under irrigation, but to provide a more steady and stable income for Africa's poor. 

Currently, only 6% of cultivated land in Africa is irrigated, meaning the majority depend on rain-fed agriculture (PAVE Irrigation Systems 2015). Groundwater could potentially increase the total land under irrigation in Africa by 120 times, improving livelihoods for approximately 40% of the continent's rural population (Windham-Wright 2015). And with groundwater supplies proving more stable than precipitation, farmers will find themselves less susceptible to the climatic fluctuations that plague Africa. 

A Sub-Saharan African resident keeping the rewards of a groundwater-fed irrigation system 
Source: PAVE Irrigation Systems 2015

In a region so tortured by poverty, providing a steady income for many is an opportunity not to be missed. Groundwater holds the ability to do this by providing a stable and widely available resource for agricultural production. 

As stressed earlier in this blog, effective monitoring and regulation must be implemented in order to ensure supplies are not over abstracted.