Drip Irrigation System for Better Harvest

Agriculture is a field that will never end, for all the youth who have interest and ambition to work in agriculture, will make the best value out of it.”

Erick Buguzi is a graduate in Bsc in Environmental Sciences and Management from Sokoine University of Agriculture (SUA). After completing his studies in 2015, he joined a research activity on agriculture conservation that was funded by the Zambian Conservation Farming Unit (CFU). The project was implemented under the Department of Engineering Sciences and Technology at SUA.

Through the research project, he was able to learn a lot about different agricultural techniques, especially on farm management, agricultural mechanization, pests and diseases control, land use planning, and irrigation system technologies.

When he was working with the project, he used to visit Sokoine University Graduate Entrepreneurs Cooperative (SUGECO) because it is nearby his work. He was so inspired by the SUGECO activities that he decided to join and to be a member of SUGECO in 2016.

“SUGECO activities were so inspirational to me. By being a member, I was able to come up with profitable ideas in agriculture that has been helping me a lot in my life.”

In 2017 he decided to seek a portion of land from SUA and he started cultivating horticultural crops in the open field. He used to spend a lot of time in watering the crops using local irrigation systems which consume a high amount of water by using cans on a small piece of land. He spent too much time and too much money to employ others to support him in watering his crops.

This year through SUGECO Erick has received one acre drip irrigation system from the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO). He is now reducing the high water consumption, cut off labor cost and getting extra time to do other activities.

“Thank you SUGECO for supporting me a set of drip irrigation, now I have one acre maize farm that uses drip irrigation and I expect to harvest a lot this year”