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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 might irrigate his drought-hit crops more cheaply, easily and efficiently using a pump fuelled by cotton waste.

"Who could believe it's possible to make a fuel better than diesel from cotton seeds? I didn't!" chuckled Mathoka, crouching 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, walking over to a close-by tree and plucking a large green pawpaw. "Irrigation with this biodiesel water pump has helped me get greater yields, specifically throughout drought periods."

Mathoka said his earnings 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 routine diesel.

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

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

That suggests that as well as being cleaner and more affordable than routine fuel, it is more sustainable than other biofuels due to the fact that no additional land is needed to produce it.

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

"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 business 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 likewise to regional farmers for watering."

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

DRY RIVER BEDS

Climate modification is taking a toll across east Africa and increasingly erratic weather condition is becoming commonplace in countries such as Kenya, Somalia, Uganda and Ethiopia, leading to lower rains.

The repeating droughts are destroying crops and pastures and are starving animals - pressing countless individuals in the Horn of Africa to the brink of extreme cravings.

The number of Kenyans in need of food help in March surged by practically 70 percent over a duration of 8 months to 1.1 million, largely due to poor rains, according to government figures.

With nearly half Kenya's 47 counties stated to have a major scarcity of rain, humanitarian agencies are warning of increased cravings in the months ahead.

"Only light rainfall is anticipated through June ... and this is not anticipated to alleviate drought in impacted locations of Kenya and Somalia," said the Famine Early Warning Systems Network in its most current report.

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

In Kitui's Kyuso area, the signs are already evident.

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

Villagers complain of trekking longer distances - often more than 10 km (6 miles) with their donkeys loaded with empty jerry cans looking for water.

Small-scale farmers, the majority of whom depend on rain-fed agriculture, discuss strategies to sell their goats to make ends satisfy if the harvest is bad.

BATTLING DROUGHT WITH BIODIESEL

But not all Kitui's farmers are stressed.

A small but growing number are shedding their burden of dependence on the weather condition - and buying irrigation systems powered by Zaynagro's cotton seed biodiesel through a pay-as-you-go plan introduced more than 3 years earlier.

Neighbouring farmers band together to purchase the watering system - which consists of the biodiesel pump, 12 metres of pipelines and 10 litres of biodiesel - at expenses starting from 32,000 shillings, depending upon the size of the pump.

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

Farmer Alex Babu Kitheka, 39, said the biodiesel pump enabled him to irrigate a bigger part of his one-acre plot, where he grows a variety 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 3 months. With the biodiesel pump, I can make 45,000 shillings," said Alex Babu Kitheka, standing near his plot in Ilangilo town, 40 km (25 miles) from Kitui town.

CIRCULAR ECONOMY

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

"The instalment plan is excellent. Most farmers do not have the cash and can not easily get a loan to buy a pump like this," said Maurice Kitheka Munyoki, 41, as he stood next to his blue biodiesel pump.

"Having a scheme like this helps us a lot. Our yields are great which indicates we can settle the expense of the pump slowly in percentages, and have money left over to pay the school charges."

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

But such biofuel plans are promising since they create a 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 model - user friendly, robust technology, guaranteed supply of biodiesel integrated with a pay-as-you-go scheme - might assist electrify rural Africa, he stated.

"There is a mosaic of sustainable energy alternatives on the planet. The key problem is evaluating ideas and approaches in a collective style," stated Sanyal.

"Other cotton ginning factories in the region need to attempt and gain from this experiment. Financial organizations need to begin 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, ladies's and LGBT+ rights, human trafficking, property rights and environment change. Visit http://news.trust.org)