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By Nita Bhalla

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

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

"But it works," he said, walking over to a close-by tree and plucking a big green pawpaw. "Irrigation with this biodiesel water pump has actually assisted me get higher yields, especially throughout drought durations."

Mathoka said his incomes had actually doubled in the 2 years he has been pumping water using biodiesel, which is both more effective and 20 shillings ($0.20) per litre more affordable than regular diesel.

The biodiesel he is using is not just great news for him - it is likewise excellent news for the world.

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

That indicates that in addition to being cleaner and cheaper than regular fuel, it is more sustainable than other biofuels due to the fact that 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 pressed farmers to change from crops-for-food to more profitable crops-for-fuel - worsening food lacks.

"Our biodiesel comes from crushing cotton seeds left over as waste after ginning - the procedure of separating the seeds from raw cotton," said 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 use it for our trucks, sell it to the United Nations to run a few of their buses - and also to local farmers for irrigation."

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

DRY RIVER BEDS

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

The recurring dry spells are destroying crops and pastures and are starving animals - pressing countless individuals in the Horn of Africa to the brink of severe appetite.

The variety of Kenyans in need of food help in March rose by practically 70 percent over a duration of 8 months to 1.1 million, mostly due to bad rains, according to federal government figures.

With practically half Kenya's 47 counties declared to have a serious scarcity of rain, humanitarian firms are alerting of increased hunger in the months ahead.

"Only light rains is anticipated through June ... and this is not expected to relieve dry spell in impacted areas of Kenya and Somalia," said the Famine Early Warning Systems Network in its newest report.

"Well below-average crop production, poor animals body conditions, and increased regional food prices are expected, which will decrease poor homes' access to food."

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

Rivers, water pans and dams are drying up as an outcome of the extended drought.

Villagers complain of trekking longer ranges - sometimes more than 10 km (6 miles) with their donkeys packed with empty jerry cans in search of water.

Small-scale farmers, the majority of whom depend on rain-fed farming, talk about plans to offer their goats to make ends satisfy if the harvest is poor.

BATTLING DROUGHT WITH BIODIESEL

But not all Kitui's farmers are fretted.

A small however growing number are shedding their burden of reliance on the weather condition - and purchasing irrigation systems powered by Zaynagro's cotton seed biodiesel through a pay-as-you-go scheme released more than 3 years ago.

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

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

Farmer Alex Babu Kitheka, 39, stated the biodiesel pump permitted him to water 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 3 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 major advantage in assisting enhance their output.

"The instalment scheme is good. Most farmers do not have the money and can not quickly 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 assists us a lot. Our yields are good which suggests we can settle the cost of the pump gradually in small amounts, and have money left over to pay the school costs."

Zaynagro's initiative is still in its early phases, with couple of farmers having actually paid back the full cost of the pumps.

But such biofuel schemes are appealing due to the fact that they produce a circular economy by turning waste to biofuel for profit, stated Sanjoy Sanyal, senior partner for Clean Energy Finance at the World Resources Institute.

The simpleness of the model - easy-to-use, robust innovation, guaranteed supply of biodiesel combined with a - might help amaze rural Africa, he said.

"There is a mosaic of sustainable energy alternatives worldwide. The key issue is checking concepts and methods in a collaborative fashion," said Sanyal.

"Other cotton ginning factories in the area ought to try and gain from this experiment. Banks ought to start try out loans to groups of farmers. International donors and financiers 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, residential or commercial property rights and environment change. Visit http://news.trust.org)