Ghana has launched a support and web tool system in Tamale to help policy makers to identify where ideal water systems should be sited.
The Targeting AGwater Management Intervention (TAGMI) system is expected to help boost food production and address challenges in the Limpopo and the Volta River Basins.
A researcher at the Stockholm Environmental Institute (SEI) named Annemarieke de Bruin, launched the tool at a day’s workshop organized for heads of state agencies, civil society groups and development partners from Ghana and Burkina Faso.
She explained that TAGMI was a production from a three-year research as part of the CGIAR-Challenge Programme’s Basin Development Challenges (CGIAR-CPBDC), which researchers’ practitioners and farmers identified to manage rainfall.
The nationally used web tool has defined Bayesian network models to review the likelihood of developing Agriculture Water Management (AWM) in the various Volta River Basins based on a range of social, human, physical, financial and natural factors.
The researcher added that TAGMI included AWM technological interventions including soil and water conservation, conservation agriculture, small-scale irrigation and small reservoirs.
Dr Mathias Fosu, a Principal Research Scientist at the Savanna Agricultural Research Institute (SARI), said the tool when adopted by government would avoid the human element of bias involved in deciding on where to locate a water system.
