Article
Between water stewardship and independent global water certification: learning from smallholder rice farmers, Karonga, Malawi
Practical Action Publishing
(2021)
Abstract
Cooperation and locally driven water management are at the forefront of food production water management for smallholder farmers in low-income countries. The aim of this paper was to critically reflect on the experiences of 5,819 smallholder rice farmers in Karonga District, Malawi, who were members of a farmers’ organization that achieved improved water stewardship, but could not achieve Alliance for Water Stewardship certification within a three-year project. The data for this paper were obtained through farmer and stakeholder interviews. The partnership attempted to bring together four parties: academics, farmers, local government, and a non-governmental organization. The farmers were trained by combining stewardship and certification topics through a train-the-trainer approach. The farmers’ organization primarily focuses on agribusiness; therefore, they did not have any water-related data or detailed farm boundaries from the large and dispersed group of farmers and could not obtain a collective water permit. Understanding water governance was difficult for many farmers. Furthermore, moving from stewardship to certification presented some financial challenges. Critical thinking and questioning are required, along with a deeper understanding of the local context, logistical hindrances, priorities, alternatives, culture, and science, to evaluate how projects are designed and partially succeed or fail from the perspective of low-income farmers in the Global South.
Keywords
- lessons learned,
- Malawi,
- rice,
- rural,
- smallholder,
- water
Disciplines
Publication Date
2021
DOI
10.3362/1756-3488.20-00006
Citation Information
Rochelle Holm and Alice Ngulube Magombo. "Between water stewardship and independent global water certification: learning from smallholder rice farmers, Karonga, Malawi" Practical Action Publishing Vol. 40 Iss. 1 (2021) Available at: http://works.bepress.com/rochelle-holm/39/