Africa-Press – Seychelles. The irrigation project to connect some 80 Val d’Andorre farmers with the newly set-up reservoirs so as to help address the water shortage, is expected to be completed by December this year.
The project, initiated by the Val d’Andorre Farmers Association, with the support of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa), as well as the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), under the Eco-System Based Adaptation (EBA) project, comprises the construction of two concrete tanks with a capacity of 320,000 litres.
Two components include the installation of hoses to direct water to the reservoirs, namely, installing a water connection from the Bougainville source to supply the reservoir, and another to supply the reservoir located at Merle. Furthermore, it involves the installation of hoses from the reservoirs to the farms.
Minister for Agriculture, Climate Change and Environment, Flavien Joubert, yesterday informed the National Assembly that the project is presently in the final phases and experienced major delays due to the shortage of 2-inch hoses on the local market.
“Since mid-2019 up until July 2020, there were no suppliers who could supply the department with this. With the arrival of a load of the hose in mid July 2022, the department of Agriculture has initiated the procedures and has been given the approval to purchase 2.7 kilometres of hose, and the necessary plumbing accessories to complete the project,” Minister Joubert stated.
The payment is to be finalised this week, with work to put in place the irrigation system starting as soon as payment is issued and the remaining materials acquired.
According to the minister, the department still faces some challenges relating to the maintenance of irrigation systems and in introducing new ones, with lack of human resource and capacity to do so as the main problem.
“The department has other systems that it is planning to invest in, such as a pump system to facilitate water connection for smaller sources, but actually, it is a matter of capacity of our staff. Recently, the people in irrigation have informed us of transportation issues. We get much demand over the weekend and during the evenings, as well as in dry periods where they have to facilitate access to water,” Minister Joubert stated.
The department is currently planning seventeen irrigation projects, six of which are on Praslin.
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