Our Work
Agriculture in Africa is facing difficult challenges in the coming decades. Climate change in combination with the exponential population growth will further threaten production and require a smart usage of the vulnerable water resources of our planet.
With the recent launch of a series sophisticated satellites from different space agencies we are now in the position to measure water availability within an agricultural field.
The IWACA-TECH project uses this new data stream to improve water use of irrigated fields without losing productivity.
How we do it
By combining smart mobile systems used by operators in the field with advanced satellite data, the project aims to boost both the water use efficiency and water productivity of large scale irrigation systems.
The measurements and control actions are performed by human operators who are guided by a mobile application. The operators dynamically interact with a control system where their steps and the water demand from the crop are updated with satellite information.
Dutch water expertise
Agriculture is the largest water consumer in many river basins, and its expanding water requirements threaten the water availability for other users, including towns and cities as well as ecosystems, which include valuable estuarine and deltaic ecosystems such as mangroves and local fisheries.
Irrigated agriculture is also known to be a relatively inefficient water user. By increasing the water use efficiency of agriculture, which is one of the priority goals of Dutch development cooperation, the water security of other users will be enhanced.
The Project Team
Partners for Water
VanderSat observes water and temperature at field scale across the globe using satellites. Every day, everywhere on earth, with unmatched accuracy.
Tongaat Hulett is an agriculture and agri-processing business, focusing on the complementary feedstocks of sugarcane and maize. The company had its origins on the north coast of KwaZulu-Natal, specifically the town of Tongaat.
MWM develops software that keeps humans in the loop, empowering them with state of the art monitoring technology for mobile devices. Using our technology, any person with a smart mobile device can objectively and accurately measure water levels and read meter values.
IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, formerly known as UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education is the largest international graduate water education facility in the world and is based in Delft, Netherlands.
Delft University of Technology also known as TU Delft, is the largest and oldest Dutch public technological university, located in Delft, Netherlands.
The Eduardo Mondlane University is the oldest and largest university in Mozambique. The UEM is located in Maputo and has about 30,000 students enrolled
ARA-Sul is the water agency responsible for the river basins in southern Mozambique, including the trans-boundary flood prone rivers Limpopo and Maputo.
The Iwacatech project is funded by the Partners voor Water Program of the Dutch Government.
