Background

Jatsabi is a small village on the bank of Kurichhu in Kurtoed Gewog under Lhuentse Dzongkhag. It is located at the altitude of 1500 masl. Jatsabi has only 11 households (7 females and 4 males), with households mainly depending on livestock and cereal crops for their livelihoods. The farmers grow paddy and maize as a staple crop and maintain small kitchen gardens. The village covers 30.40 acres of land, of which 8 acres constitutes of wetland and 22.40 acres of dryland

Jatsabi was selected as one of the climate-smart villages identified through a climate vulnerability assessment, jointly conducted by Office of the Programme Management (OPM), Agriculture Research and Development Centre (ARDC) Wengkhar, Regional Livestock Development Centre (RLDC) Kanglung, Regional Agriculture Marketing and Cooperative Office (RAMCO) Mongar, Lhuentse Dzongkhag Agriculture, and Livestock sectors and Gewog extension centers.

Pump Irrigation

The people of Jatsabi have been facing a water shortage for paddy and vegetable cultivation for ages. Insufficient water and poor marketing channels have also discouraged farmers to go for commercial vegetable cultivation. Subsequently, the fields are felt fallow after maize and paddy harvest.

To address the issues of insufficient water supply for paddy and winter vegetable cultivation, ARDC Wengkhar has supported pump irrigation to Jatsabi, with fund support from CARLEP-IFAD. Currently, 95% of the work has been completed.

The pump irrigation system constitutes reservoir tanks with a capacity of 120,000 liters connected with a filter tank of 40,000 litres and a relay pump tank of 12000 liters. The length of the irrigation pipe from the pump site to the reservoir tank is 350 m. The pump has water discharge capacity of 14.3 liters/sec.

The construction of the water pump irrigation is expected to solve the multitude of issues like water shortage, fallow land, and rural-urban migration, thereby creating an opportunity for the farmers to revert most of the fallow land to intensive cultivation of vegetables on a commercial scale for income generation and initiate resilient livelihoods.

Visit by Dasho Dzongda

On 16^th April 2020, Lhuentse Dzongda, Dasho Jambay Wangchuk visited the pump irrigation site at Jatsabi, accompanied by the Program Director of ARDC Wengkhar, Programme Director and Agriculture Component Manager of CARLEP, and Dzongkhag Agriculture Officer. The visit saw a brief tour of the ongoing water pump irrigation funded by CARLEP-IFAD.

The main purpose of the visit was to monitor the on-going construction of the water pump irrigation and discuss the prospect of a variety of crop cultivation at the site. During the visit, Dasho Dzongda encouraged the farmers to make use of the pump efficiently. Dasho also encouraged farmers on having an individual greenhouse for the cultivation of vegetables. Program Directors further highlighted that the pump irrigation will be an asset for enabling farmers to increase their production of paddy during summer and vegetables in winter for self-consumption and sales. The farmers have been also enlightened on the more income-generating opportunities through growing high-value crops such as onion, chili, tomato, and asparagus. The farmers were also informed about the cost-sharing modality to procure materials for protected agriculture. Besides, they were informed about the training that will be provided to the group, water user association(WUA) to familiarize them about the operation and maintenance of the pump.

To ensure the effective use of the pump irrigation, the Gewog agriculture officer will prepare a production plan with assistance from the researchers at ARDC Wengkhar and assist farmers with the commercial vegetable cultivation.

Reported by: Chhimi Lhamo, GKMO