Mariam Sanni

The International Water Management Institute (IWMI) has launched a Multi-stakeholder Platform on Farmer-led Irrigation (MSD-FLID) to foster cross
sectoral engagement, collaborative priority setting, demand articulation, and investment to shape the country’s FLID agenda.

The platform is aimed towards bringing together a diverse range of stakeholders across Nigeria’s irrigation and agricultural sectors.

IWMI officially launched the platform on September 10th with the first in a series of multi-stakeholder dialogues – a crucial component of the platform, in partnership with the Federal Ministry of Water Resources & Sanitation (FMWR&S), Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security (FMA&FS), Bank of Agriculture (BOA), and the Agro-Climatic Resilience in Semi-Arid Landscapes (ACReSAL) Project.

As Africa grapples with the increased frequency and intensity of climate impacts, irrigation becomes a critical adaptation and resilience building strategy. There is significant potential for small-scale farmer-led irrigation development (FLID) in Nigeria.

As a farmer-driven approach, FLID offers opportunities to explore solar-powered solutions and public-private partnerships that promote scalable irrigation innovations, helping to bring these technologies and solutions to a wider group of smallholders. FLID’s full potential, however, remains underutilized.

Despite the availability of numerous irrigation innovations, adoption is constrained by weak cross-sectoral coordination, policy incoherence, lack of flexible financing, and misalignment of national needs and priorities with development interventions.

Supporting farmer-led irrigation development to drive Nigeria’s food security needs urgent action. Boosting productivity, food security, and improving livelihoods through irrigation development requires an enabling environment for effective coordination and enhanced harmonization of programs to accelerate irrigation innovation uptake.

The dialogue highlighted the critical importance of improved coordination to expand FLID in Nigeria.

Speaking at the launch, Dr. Olufunke Cofie, IWMI’s Africa Director for Research Impact, emphasized IWMI’s long-standing commitment to supporting food system transformation in Africa and in Nigeria particularly:

“The potential for farmer-led irrigation in Nigeria and across sub-Saharan Africa is significant. Stakeholders must collaborate to realize this potential. FLID is central to African agrifood systems transformation and crucial for resilience building.”

Engr. Esther Oluniyi, the Director of Irrigation and Drainage, FMWR&S, and Mr. Ayo Sotinrin, the Managing, Bank of Agriculture (BOA), Nigeria, both emphasized the essential need for a multi-stakeholder platform to address the challenges of scaling up FLID.

“Strong partnerships are key to the transformation of Nigeria’s irrigation sector. We are ready to collaborate with all stakeholders,” Engr Esther Oluniyi, Director Irrigation and Drainage, FMWR&S, Nigeria.

Mr. Sotinrin also reaffirmed BOA’s commitment to supporting FLID through innovative financing products, strategic partnerships, and schemes for solar irrigation.

“BOA will continue to work with IWMI to co-design tailored financial products for FLID, develop financing models for solar irrigation, and leverage its network for FLID advancement,” Sotinrin stated.

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