Water, an environmental product of the system of farming in Brazil
BRASILIA: For the first time in her life, retired physical education teacher Elizabeth Ribeiro planted a tree, thorny papaya, native to Brazil’s central savanna.
The opportunity arose on Nov 28, when the Pipiripau Water Producer Project, which is being carried out 50 km from Brasilia, promoted the planting of 430 seedlings donated by participants in the eighth World Water Forum, held in the Brazilian capital in March.
“Before, 100 per cent of the irrigation here was done through furrows in the ground. The water we have today would not even cover 10 per cent of the needs, because that method of irrigation wastes a lot of water and now it rains less: the rate dropped from 1,600 mm a year to 1,100,” said forum participant Geraldo Magela Gontijo
“I learned about the project during the Forum and I fell in love,” explained Ribeiro, who donated the equivalent of 13 dollars for the purchase of seedlings and the invitation to plant. Vanira Tavares, a veteran English translator and also a brand-new tree planter, did the same thing.
Reforestation, especially along riverbanks, is just one of the many actions that make up the Water Producer Programme ( PPA) designed in 2001 by the National Water Agency (ANA), the national regulator of water resources.
Soil conservation measures, which retain water, preventing erosion and sedimentation of rivers, also contribute to the quantity and quality of water available at each site.
It is easier to drive along the roads of the Pipiripau basin than in other rural areas. Instead of potholes and puddles there are gutters that capture the runoff rainwater, which is stored in subsurface galleries, referred to as “barraginhas” ( small dams) along the roadsides.
As a result, heavy rains no longer flood the land, washing away nutrients and covering the soil with waste products. And the retained water feeds springs and crops longer.
Water must also be harvested: this is the concept disseminated and put into practice by the PPA, which has implemented 60 projects across Brazil, with the aim of restoring sub-basins that supply large springs or rivers on which millions of people depend.
Farmers who join the PPA projects receive payment for environmental services, estimated according to different criteria, such as the possible water contribution or the value of the crop that is not planted because the land is allocated for reforestation.
These payments are key to encouraging farmers to participate, but the amounts vary widely in contracts between the payer – usually the municipality – and the owners of the land.
“Where there is a shortage of a given product, the price goes up,” Ewandro Moreira, ANA’s assistant coordinator for these projects, told IPS.
The Pipiripau, where one of the first PPA projects was carried out, crosses the northeast of the Federal District and supplies a large part of the population of Planaltina and Sobradinho, satellite cities of Brasilia that total about 260,000 inhabitants, according to planning agency.
This project was born in 2011 because of “the dispute over the river’s water between public supply and irrigation, accentuated during times of scarcity between August and October,” said Rafael Mello, superintendent of water resources for the Federal District’s Water, Energy and Basic Sanitation Regulatory Agency (Adasa).
Adasa coordinates the management of the project in which 17 different entities are involved, ranging from government water, agriculture and environmental agencies to non-governmental organisations, in addition to the state- owned Banco do Brasil bank and the government agency in charge of roads.
All these “partners” come together in the Project Management Unit, in order to coordinate the multi- sectoral collective decision-making process, which boosts efficiency.
“Sometimes reforesting riverbanks does not solve the problem,” if, for example, agrochemicals and sediment continue to run off into the rivers, water resource specialist Rossini Matos Sena, who represents ANA in the management of Pipiripau, told IPS.
“Production and water resources have to be harmonised,” Moreira said. — IPS the district