Energy Needs in Smallholder Agriculture

Overview

Access to modern energy services and equipment for smallholder farmers could have significant positive impacts on food security, gender empowerment and rural poverty. The publication "Growing Power: Exploring energy needs in smallholder agriculture" by Sarah Best, International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), analyses the ‘productive uses’ of energy. In detail, the author discusses energy needs and impacts in smallholder food systems, as well as potential approaches to meeting those demands.

Productive Use of Energy

While other approaches define productive uses of energy in a rathe broad way, this paper defines productive uses of energy as uses that "directly increase incomes or add value to goods and services such as power for milling machine" (p.10). Nontheless, it acknowledges the importance of energy for other uses such as education or health services.

-> Please also see the article "Productive Use of Electricity" for more information on different definitions of productive use, as well as other articles on the "Productive Use Portal".

Smallholder Energy Needs

Quantifying the energy access gap in smallholder-based food systems is challenging, as energy sources and uses are diverse among the millions of small farms, rural enterprises and communities. Nevertheless, some data provide an idea on the scale of the problem, for example for the case of Sub-Saharan Africa:

• 65% of farm power relies on human power, 25% on animal power, only 10& on engines. Compared to other developing regions with engines generating 50% of farm power, this is very low
  
• Only 4% of cropland is irrgated. In South Asia this is 39%, and in East Asia 29%
  
• About 10-20% of grains are lost after harvest, accounting for about US$4bn. Key causes are lack of appropriate storage, processing, cooling equipment
  

Energy needs of smallholders and rural enterprises can be categorized into two main types:

1. energy for transport, and
   
2. energy for production, processing and commercialisation of goods, including diverse activities e.g. pumping water, irrigating crops, drying etc. (see figure below)
   

The paper - as well as most of the available literature - focsues on the latter. Other energy inputs such as indirect energy inputs (e.g. fertilisers) and household energy (e.g. for cooking) are not covered by the paper.

Depending on the level of power needed and the resources availbale locally different energy technologies are required:

• Electrical energy: suitable for powering water pumps, milling machines, fridges
  
• Mechanical energy: suitable for production and processing e.g. for harvesters or tractors
  
• Thermal energy: suitable for different value-adding processes e.g. cooking, drying, cooling
  

The report points out that mechanical and thermal energy are not sufficiently targeted by policymakers and donors.

Regarding areas of energy needs, the paper highlights land preparation, irrigation, processing, storage:

Land preparation

Most land is tilled, ploughed and weeded by aninmal and human power in Sub-Saharan Africa (65% human effort, 25% animals, 10% engines) .

Weeding in particular is time consuming and physically demanding. At the same time, weeding is critical as more than 30% of crops are averagely lost due to weed infestation.

The use of machines could increase yields substantially i.e. while a farm family using human power can cultivate 1.5 hectares per year, the use of animal power would increase that to 4 hectares and the use of tractor power even to 8.

Irrigation

In Sub-Saharan Africa only 4% of land is irrigated. Irrigation would allo farmers to grow one or more crops throughout the year, decreasing farmers' vulnerability.

There are different technical options for irrigation, for more information see e.g. an article on irrgation methods on Agriwaterpedia.info.

Processing

Key processing activities are drying, milling and pressing. Using machinery saves manual labour and increases efficiency. Drying and cooling of ruit and meat is crucial for preserving food and to meet quality standards. There is potential for applying thermal energy technologies such as solar dryers.

Storage

Improved storage is crucial for reducing post-harvest food losses. This includes refrigeration and requires energy inputs.

-> See also the article "Energy within Food and Agricultural Value Chains" and "Refrigeration: Solar Cooling"

Recommendatons for projects promoting "productive use of energy"

Whils these data and information provide a broad overview of energy gaps and needs, it is crucial to align priorities with local settings. Internventions need to be more people-centred, "bottom-up", and better tailored to local contexts - as have shown experiences from energy as well as agricultural mechanization. In specific this means to answer e.g.:

• what do people want energy for?
  
• which types of equipment is used?
  
• what can people afford?
  
• what about the capactiy to run and maintain sytsms?
  

Thus, it is necessary to take a holistic view on smallholders' energy needs beyond the farm gate. Projects at the Energy-Agriculture Nexus should therefore take a demand-led approach, being situated in a wider rural development context (e.g. energy for health clinics vs. energy for farming). The paper provides further recommendations:

1. Value chain analysis can help pinpoint energy needs and opportunities
e.g. to identify bottlenecks to productivity, or pinpoint where energy could have biggest impacts on income, what is most cost-effective etc.

2. Needs assessments should place a strong emphasis on gender
About 43% of the agricultural workforce in developing countries is made up by women. They mostly have less access to productive assets than men. If this access of women would increased, the respective yields could be increased by 20-30%

3. Needs vary hugely across different farming systems
Smallholders are a heterogeneous group, working with diverse farming systems - depending on crops, locality, context, culture and agro-ecological zones. Thus, solutions have to be selected accordingly.

4. 'Modern energy services' is not always the answer to a benefit
Farmers need to weigh up the costs and the benefits of using modern energy services. Sometimes significant improvements can be reached though low-cost, 'traditional' technology e.g. treadle pumps.

Download

► Growing Power: Exploring energy needs in smallholder agriculture. IIED, London, Best, S., (2014)

Further Information

• Energy within Food and Agricultural Value Chains
• Utz, V., GIZ, 2011. Modern Energy Services for Modern Agriculture: A Review of Smallholder Farming in Developing Countries
• Powering Agriculture Portal on energypedia
• Productive Use Portal on energypedia