By Nita Bhalla

KITUI, Kenya, June 6 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Kenyan farmer Abel Mutie Mathoka believed it must be a joke when he was informed he could irrigate his drought-hit crops more cheaply, easily and efficiently utilizing a pump sustained by cotton waste.

"Who could believe it's possible to make a fuel better than diesel from cotton seeds? I didn't!" laughed Mathoka, crouching down to inspect the watermelons on his 10-acre (four-hectare) shared plot in Ituri village in Kenya's southeast Kitui county.

"But it works," he said, strolling over to a close-by tree and plucking a large green pawpaw. "Irrigation with this biodiesel water pump has actually assisted me get greater yields, particularly throughout dry spell periods."

Mathoka said his incomes had doubled in the 2 years he has been pumping water utilizing biodiesel, which is both more efficient and 20 shillings ($0.20) per litre less expensive than routine diesel.

The biodiesel he is utilizing is not simply great news for him - it is likewise great news for the planet.

Unlike the majority of biofuels, which are derived from crops such as maize, sugarcane, soybean, rapeseed and jatropha, it is made from a byproduct of the cotton-making process.

That means that along with being cleaner and cheaper than routine fuel, it is more sustainable than other biofuels since no extra land is required to produce it.

From Brazil to Indonesia, the rush to cultivate biofuel crops has neighborhoods off their land and pressed farmers to change from crops-for-food to more lucrative crops-for-fuel - exacerbating food lacks.

"Our biodiesel comes from squashing cotton seeds left over as waste after ginning - the procedure of separating the seeds from raw cotton," stated Taher Zavery, managing director of Zaynagro Industries Ltd, the Kitui-based company producing the biodiesel.

"We began producing and utilizing it to power our cotton ginning factory in 2011. With increased production, we now utilize it for our trucks, offer it to the United Nations to run a few of their buses - and likewise to regional farmers for irrigation."

More than 1,200 farmers in Kitui have so far purchased biodiesel pumps for irrigation as part of an initiative launched by Zaynagro in 2015, said Zavery.

DRY RIVER BEDS

Climate modification is taking a toll across east Africa and increasingly erratic weather is ending up being commonplace in nations such as Kenya, Somalia, Uganda and Ethiopia, resulting in lower rains.

The repeating dry spells are destroying crops and pastures and are starving animals - pushing millions of individuals in the Horn of Africa to the verge of extreme appetite.

The number of Kenyans in need of food aid in March rose by practically 70 percent over a period of 8 months to 1.1 million, mainly due to poor rains, according to government figures.

With practically half Kenya's 47 counties stated to have a serious lack of rain, humanitarian agencies are alerting of increased cravings in the months ahead.

"Only light rainfall is anticipated through June ... and this is not expected to reduce drought in impacted areas of Kenya and Somalia," said the Famine Early Warning Systems Network in its latest report.

"Well below-average crop production, bad livestock body conditions, and increased regional food costs are prepared for, which will lower poor households' access to food."

In Kitui's Kyuso area, the indications are currently obvious.

Rivers, water pans and dams are drying up as an outcome of the prolonged dry spell.

Villagers suffer travelling longer distances - in some cases more than 10 km (6 miles) with their donkeys loaded with empty jerry cans looking for water.

Small-scale farmers, the majority of whom are reliant on rain-fed farming, talk about strategies to sell their goats to make ends satisfy if the harvest is poor.

BATTLING DROUGHT WITH BIODIESEL

But not all Kitui's farmers are worried.

A little but growing number are shedding their concern of reliance on the weather - and purchasing watering systems powered by Zaynagro's cotton seed biodiesel through a pay-as-you-go plan introduced more than 3 years back.

Neighbouring farmers unite to invest in the watering system - which includes the biodiesel pump, 12 metres of pipelines and 10 litres of biodiesel - at costs beginning with 32,000 shillings, depending on the size of the pump.

The farmers make an initial payment, then pay interest-free regular monthly instalments until the overall is paid off. They purchase the biodiesel to run the pumps from Zaynagro at 80 shillings a litre.

Farmer Alex Babu Kitheka, 39, said the biodiesel pump permitted him to irrigate a bigger portion of his one-acre plot, where he grows a range of vegetables including maize, tomatoes, spinach and sweet potatoes.

"With a diesel pump, maize yields were lower and I would get 15,000 shillings in three months. With the biodiesel pump, I can earn 45,000 shillings," said Alex Babu Kitheka, standing near his plot in Ilangilo village, 40 km (25 miles) from Kitui town.

CIRCULAR ECONOMY

Other farmers indicate the plan as a significant advantage in helping enhance their output.

"The instalment scheme is great. Most farmers don't have the cash and can not quickly get a loan to purchase a pump like this," stated Maurice Kitheka Munyoki, 41, as he stood beside his blue biodiesel pump.

"Having a plan like this helps us a lot. Our yields are excellent which implies we can pay off the cost of the pump gradually in little quantities, and have cash left over to pay the school charges."

Zaynagro's effort is still in its early stages, with few farmers having paid back the complete expense of the pumps.

But such biofuel plans are appealing due to the fact that they create a circular economy by turning waste to biofuel for revenue, stated Sanjoy Sanyal, senior associate for Clean Energy Finance at the World Resources Institute.

The simpleness of the design - easy-to-use, robust technology, ensured supply of biodiesel integrated with a pay-as-you-go plan - could help electrify rural Africa, he stated.

"There is a mosaic of sustainable energy alternatives on the planet. The essential concern is evaluating ideas and methods in a collective fashion," said Sanyal.

"Other cotton ginning factories in the region ought to attempt and learn from this experiment. Financial institutions ought to begin exploring with loans to groups of farmers. International donors and financiers need to support experimentation."

($1 = 101.3000 Kenyan shillings) (Reporting by Nita Bhalla @nitabhalla, Editing by Claire Cozens. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, ladies's and LGBT+ rights, human trafficking, property rights and climate modification. Visit http://news.trust.org)