Handing over 69 climate change resilient ponds to farmers

The Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Dak Lakprovince has just organized a Handover ceremony to put into use the climate change resilient pond project and support agricultural materials for farmers in Ea Kenh commune (Krong Pac district).

The climate change-resistant pond project has a capacity of 4,300 m3 and belongs to Mr Le Van Thang's household (Nung ethnic group, Thanh Binh village, Ea Kenh commune). It received support in expanding to increase water storage capacity. The support came from the Project to Strengthen the Resilience of Small-scale Agriculture in Water Security due to climate change in the Central Highlands and South Central region of Dak Lak province

The project aims to ensure enough water to irrigate coffee 4 times in the dry season 2023-2024 (previously there were only 2 irrigation periods), contributing to stabilizing production and increasing income for farming households.

Mr. Le Van Thang said, his family has 5 acres of coffee planted with some durian and avocado trees. Previously, Mr. Thang's family had a small pond to store water, but it was only enough for about 2 irrigate per year during the dry season. Therefore, garden plants often lack water, reducing productivity and reducing income. Mr Thang's family wanted to dig a pond and store water for the dry season but did not have favourable conditions.

“Fortunately, the SACCR project supported the family with machinery to expand the pond, helping to store more water. It is estimated that the water in the pond is enough to irrigate 4 times during the dry season, so the productivity of coffee as well as fruit trees will certainly increase in the coming seasons.

In addition to serving my family, I will share the water source for irrigation with 2 households with neighbouring fields. Aside from irrigation, ponds will be stocked with fish for additional income. Thanks to the SACCR project, my family has enough water for irrigation, thereby growing the economy", Mr Thang said.

Mr Pham Ngoc Nam, Deputy Director of SACCR Dak Lak Project Management Board, said that the project be implemented in 11 communes in 4 districts of Dak Lak province, including Ea H'leo, Ea Kar, Krong Pac and Cu M'gar from 2022-2026.

The project has a total investment of more than $ 5 million, equivalent to about VND 118.5 billion. Of which, non-refundable funding is more than VND 102 billion and counterpart capital from the provincial budget is nearly VND 16 billion.

According to Mr Nam, the goal of the project is to strengthen the adaptability of vulnerable smallholder farmers to water resource imbalance due to climate change. The project's beneficiaries are poor, near-poor households, ethnic minority households and female breadwinner households.

After nearly 2 years of implementation, the project has supported capacity building for more than 34,000 farming households in Dak Lak through field training courses (FFS) on soil and biomass management. The project also provided fertilizer support to 1,091 poor and near-poor households through barter vouchers, valued over VND 5 billion; supporting the construction and upgrading of 69 climate change-resistant ponds out of a total of 260 target ponds.

Mr. Pham Dinh Van, Head of the Central Management Board of Irrigation Projects (Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development) said, In 2017, the unit coordinated with UNDP and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to mobilize non-refundable grants from the GCF fund for 5 provinces, including Dak Lak, Dak Nong, Ninh Thuan, Binh Thuan and Khanh Hoa to help households cope with drought.

With non-refundable funding of more than $ 30 million from GCF through UNDP along with the $ 124.06 million loan of the WEIDAP project using ADB loans, more than 222,400 farming households affected by drought in the above 5 provinces will receive help.

The project has 2 main components including: Component 1 is providing water-efficient irrigation infrastructure and enhancing water storage capacity to address water scarcity risks; Component 2 is the diversification of crops adapted to climate change, soil treatment and agronomic practices, helping to reduce water input requirements for food production.

Component one will have main programs such as: building more than 4,700 new end-point connection systems for irrigation; building and renovating more than 1,100 ponds to adapt to climate change, establishing an economical irrigation system for nearly 5,000 ha; training on water resource use and management.

Component 2 includes training on climate change adaptation agriculture and climate information for over 21,000 households; and supporting agricultural materials for over 8,000 households.

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