Contributions of Small Scale Paddy Irrigation Schemes to Household Food Security in Mvomero District, Tanzania

Abstract

The Agricultural and Livestock Policy of Tanzania gives high priority to the promotion of food sufficiency and security through irrigated agriculture. The objective of this study was to assess the contributions of small scale irrigated rice production to household’s food security in Mvomero District; specifically on household’s food security status, the extent to which small scale irrigated rice production contributes to household’s food security and ways to improve sustainability of household’s food security situation in the study area. The study employed cross-sectional research design in two villages namely Sungaji and Mkingo in Mvomero District. Demographic characteristics and assets of households as well as agricultural production were collected using structured questionnaires from 55 irrigation scheme users. A systematic random sampling technique were used to obtain usersof irrigation schemes from the Village Registry Book (VRB) in the village and sampling process useda skip interval at every 8th household using random number table repeatedly. However, in order to get population sample within each village, probability proportional to size (PPS) was applied.Descriptive statistics methods were applied to analyze the data and to determine the association of the variables among irrigation scheme users in the study area. The findings indicates that 32 percent of the respondent acknowledged that irrigation schemes have increased agricultural production per unit area while almost 56.4 percent of the rice produced were served for food. However, monthly income weresignificantly correlated with the number of meals taken per day at p>0.041. Level of education and household size indicated a significant association with the number of meals per taken per day at p< 0.000 and p<0.002 respectively. On the basis of the findings, it is recommended that careful action is needed to improve irrigation infrastructure, extension services to farmers to increase productivity, market for their produce as well as access to loans/credit. Collaboration with all agriculture stakeholders is needed so as to improve the productivity to enhance household food security and community livelihood at large.