Micro Drip
Affordable Drip Irrigation for Farmers in Southern Pakistan
Dr. Sono Khangarani of Micro Drip, talks with farmers and his staff in the Tharparkar desert, where water is scarce and drip irrigation can greatly enhance productivity.
Investment Stories
The Challenge
- In Pakistan's Tharparkar desert – part of the Sindh Province – 80% of the region's farmers live on less than $1 a day. Tharparkar is one of the most food- and income-insecure regions in the country.
- In Tharparkar, poverty levels are directly related to one's access to water. The region's endemic poverty is exacerbated by prolonged spells of drought and erratic precipitation patterns.
- Lack of access to water and drought force smallholder farmers off their land in search of alternate sources of income and lead to increased rural-urban migration. This constant uprooting and dislocation carries negative economic and social impacts.
- To address both economic and food insecurity, there is a need for affordable and efficient irrigation solutions targeted to the needs of low-income farmers.
The Innovation
- Acumen Fund has partnered with Thardeep Rural Development Program, a rural development non-profit in Pakistan, to enable a technology transfer of low-cost, high-efficiency drip irrigation technologies from Global Easy Water Products, an Acumen Fund investee in India.
- Thardeep, with support from Acumen Fund, has set up Micro Drip, a for-profit drip irrigation company that procures drip systems from India. Micro Drip then markets the systems to poor farmers in the water scarce regions in Pakistan.
- The drip irrigation system delivers water directly to the spot where the crop is planted, maximizing plant growth and ensuring major input cost and water savings.
The Impact
- The distribution and use of Micro Drip's systems will allow farmers to become more economically secure and reduce dependence on rain-fed farming.
- Drip irrigation systems reduce the amount of irrigation water needed to cultivate an acre of land by 50%, enabling farmers to cultivate more land and extract higher yields at a lower cost. The drip system has proven to provide a yield improvement of over 40% for farmers and an input cost savings of around 30%.
- Year-round farming – made possible by irrigation – means that farmers do not have to uproot their families and migrate to cities during the dry season.