Farmers at Dawa benefit from rehabilitated dam

The dam serves about 20 farmers scattered on about 55 acres of land at Dawa, a predominantly farming community.

Petroleum revenue allocated to the project rehabilitated by the Ghana Irrigation Development Authority (GIDA), under the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, was GH¢570,903.

Hitherto, the farmers had a hard time getting enough water to saturate the soil for farming.

Some farmers the GRAPHIC BUSINESS spoke to said the dam was a great gift to them as they were saved from incurring heavy expenditure on irrigation for their crops.

“We plant okro, tomatoes, watermelon, pepper and occasionally onion, and now farming is smooth. We are able to farm even during the dry season when we come around the dam,” a former assembly member,” Mr Daniel Tei Nartey said.

Some farmers said the dam had been very useful because for the first time in so many years, they ate fresh okro all year round against formerly buying from the market at certain times of the year.
 
A pepper farmer, Madam Awo Ametepe, said hitherto they relied on the natural rainfall and which sometimes affected crop yields.

“Planting pepper is good for me because I can dry and sell during the dry season and get good price but watermelon and other crops depend on the market price,” she said.

Farming in Dawa

Some farmers start planting from February / March it rains although the main farming season is around April / May. During main season, most of them go out to other parts of the land to farm and come around the dam during dry season.

The Extension Officer for the area, Mr Samuel Nseboah Armah said pepper was the main crop of farmers in the area although they also planted okro, watermelon and onion at times.

“Pepper and okro are harvested within the short-term so they like planting them. At times, they also do maize and cassava but then cattle worry them,” he said.  

He said that currently, some farmers harvested about 12 bags of pepper per plot against about 10 bags outside the dam.

Features of the dam

The Dawa irrigation dam is more of an earth dam with its barriers made mostly of compacted layers of earth such as soil.

Water from the dam is diverted into underground pipelines through about 50 small valves and 10 big ones to irrigate farm lands around it.

Maintaining the dam

The Vice Chairman of the Public Interest and Accountability Committee (PIAC), Mr Kwame Jantuah, said that the rehabilitation of the dam had come as a great relief such that they should take the responsibility to oversee its management.

He said a lot of investments needed to be put into the agriculture sector which is one of the four priority areas selected for the use of Petroleum Revenue (PR) for 2011-2016.

He advised the farmers and their leaders to constantly push the GIDA to periodically desilt the dam so it can hold more water and to also reinforce the fencing around it.