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By Nita Bhalla

KITUI, Kenya, June 6 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Kenyan farmer Abel Mutie Mathoka thought it needs to be a joke when he was told he might water his drought-hit crops more inexpensively, cleanly and effectively utilizing a pump sustained by cotton waste.

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

"But it works," he said, strolling over to a neighboring tree and plucking a big green pawpaw. "Irrigation with this biodiesel water pump has actually assisted me get higher yields, specifically during dry spell durations."

Mathoka said his revenues had doubled in the two years he has been pumping water using biodiesel, which is both more effective and 20 shillings ($0.20) per litre less expensive than regular diesel.

The biodiesel he is utilizing is not simply great news for him - it is also good news for the world.

Unlike a lot of biofuels, which are obtained from crops such as maize, sugarcane, soybean, rapeseed and jatropha curcas, it is made from a by-product of the cotton-making procedure.

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

From Brazil to Indonesia, the rush to cultivate biofuel crops has actually driven forest communities off their land and pushed farmers to change from crops-for-food to more profitable crops-for-fuel - exacerbating food scarcities.

"Our biodiesel originates from crushing 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 business producing the biodiesel.

"We started producing and using it to power our cotton ginning factory in 2011. With increased production, we now use it for our trucks, offer it to the United Nations to run some of their buses - and also to regional farmers for irrigation."

More than 1,200 farmers in Kitui have so far invested in biodiesel pumps for watering as part of an initiative introduced by Zaynagro in 2015, stated Zavery.

DRY RIVER BEDS

Climate change is taking a toll across east Africa and progressively irregular weather condition is becoming commonplace in nations such as Kenya, Somalia, Uganda and Ethiopia, resulting in lower rains.

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

The number of Kenyans in requirement of food help in March surged by nearly 70 percent over a duration of eight months to 1.1 million, mostly due to poor rains, according to federal government figures.

With practically half Kenya's 47 counties stated to have a major lack of rain, humanitarian firms are cautioning of increased hunger in the months ahead.

"Only light rainfall is forecast through June ... and this is not expected to alleviate dry spell in impacted locations of Kenya and Somalia," stated the Famine Early Warning Systems Network in its newest report.

"Well below-average crop production, poor livestock body conditions, and increased local food prices are prepared for, which will reduce bad families' access to food."

In Kitui's Kyuso location, the signs are already obvious.

Rivers, water pans and dams are drying up as a result of the extended dry spell.

Villagers suffer trekking longer ranges - sometimes more than 10 km (6 miles) with their donkeys loaded with empty jerry cans looking for water.

Small-scale farmers, many of whom depend on rain-fed farming, talk about strategies to sell their goats to make ends meet if the harvest is poor.

BATTLING DROUGHT WITH BIODIESEL

But not all Kitui's farmers are stressed.

A small however growing number are shedding their burden of dependence on the weather - and purchasing irrigation systems powered by Zaynagro's cotton seed biodiesel through a pay-as-you-go scheme released more than three years ago.

Neighbouring farmers band together to invest in the irrigation system - which consists of the biodiesel pump, 12 metres of pipes and 10 litres of biodiesel - at costs beginning with 32,000 shillings, depending upon the size of the pump.

The farmers make a preliminary payment, then pay interest-free month-to-month instalments up until the overall is settled. They buy the biodiesel to run the pumps from Zaynagro at 80 shillings a litre.

Farmer Alex Babu Kitheka, 39, stated the biodiesel pump enabled him to irrigate a bigger part of his one-acre plot, where he grows a range of veggies consisting of 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," stated Alex Babu Kitheka, standing near his plot in Ilangilo village, 40 km (25 miles) from Kitui town.

CIRCULAR ECONOMY

Other farmers point to the plan as a major advantage in helping improve their output.

"The instalment plan is great. Most farmers do not have the cash and can not easily get a loan to buy 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 good which suggests we can settle the cost of the pump slowly in little quantities, and have cash left over to pay the school costs."

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

But such biofuel schemes are promising due to the fact that they create a circular economy by turning waste to biofuel for profit, said Sanjoy Sanyal, senior associate for Clean Energy Finance at the World Resources Institute.

The simpleness of the design - user friendly, robust innovation, ensured supply of biodiesel integrated with a pay-as-you-go scheme - could assist amaze rural Africa, he said.

"There is a mosaic of sustainable energy options on the planet. The essential issue is testing concepts and approaches in a collective fashion," said Sanyal.

"Other cotton ginning factories in the area must attempt and discover from this experiment. Financial organizations should start explore loans to groups of farmers. International donors and investors require 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, women's and LGBT+ rights, human trafficking, property rights and climate modification. Visit http://news.trust.org)