The Ethiopian Irrigation Development Commission has signed a USD 94 million agreement with the Korean Rural Development Cooperation. The agreement is going to facilitate the construction of an irrigation project in the Oromia region.
According to the partners the project is going to allow for the irrigation of more than 5,000 hectares of land using aquifers (water found beneath the surface of the Earth).
The project is going to take at least two years to complete with one year being allocated to feasibility and designs studies and one year for construction.
Funding from the Korean Rural Development Cooperation is going to be setup as a soft loan service, with Ethiopia being given 25 years before repayment kicks in at an appealing interest rate.
Dr. Eng. Sileshi Bekele, Minster for Water, Irrigation, and Energy affirmed that the project is going to contribute significantly to the country’s efforts to adopt modern farming methods. This is in terms of its own significance as well as the heightened cooperation it creates with South Korean experts in agriculture and irrigation.
More than 20,000 families are also expected to benefit directly from the modernisation and utilisation of resources that the project is going to facilitate. Aside from agricultural benefits, the project is going to provide fresh drinking water to the residents of the area.
The Korean Rural Development Cooperation has recently successfully implemented a similar project in Debre Zeit/ Bishoftu and Mojo. This project consisted of digging 10 aquifer ducts to irrigate 600 hectares of land; now residents are producing wheat and avocados en masse.
The new project will consist of 42 aquifer ducts.