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 could water his drought-hit crops more inexpensively, easily and efficiently utilizing a pump fuelled 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 examine the watermelons on his 10-acre (four-hectare) shared plot in Ituri town in Kenya's southeast Kitui county.

"But it works," he stated, strolling over to a close-by tree and plucking a big green pawpaw. "Irrigation with this biodiesel water pump has helped me get higher yields, especially during drought periods."

Mathoka stated his incomes had actually doubled in the 2 years he has been pumping water utilizing biodiesel, which is both more efficient and 20 shillings ($0.20) per litre less expensive than regular diesel.

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

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

That implies that along with being cleaner and less expensive than regular fuel, it is more sustainable than other biofuels since no extra land is required to produce it.

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

"Our biodiesel originates 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 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, sell it to the United Nations to run a few of their buses - and likewise to local farmers for irrigation."

More than 1,200 farmers in Kitui have up until now bought biodiesel pumps for watering as part of an effort released by Zaynagro in 2015, stated Zavery.

DRY RIVER BEDS

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

The repeating droughts are ruining crops and pastures and are starving animals - pressing millions of individuals in the Horn of Africa to the brink of extreme hunger.

The number of Kenyans in need of food aid in March surged by practically 70 percent over a duration of eight months to 1.1 million, mostly due to bad rains, according to government figures.

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

"Only light rainfall is forecast through June ... and this is not anticipated to minimize dry spell in affected areas of Kenya and Somalia," said the Famine Early Warning Systems Network in its newest report.

"Well below-average crop production, bad animals body conditions, and increased regional food costs are expected, which will lower poor households' access to food."

In Kitui's Kyuso area, the indications are currently obvious.

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

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

Small-scale farmers, most of whom are dependent on rain-fed agriculture, go over strategies to sell their goats to make ends meet 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 investing in irrigation systems powered by Zaynagro's cotton seed through a pay-as-you-go plan introduced more than 3 years back.

Neighbouring farmers unite to buy 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 an initial payment, then pay interest-free monthly instalments till the total is paid off. They buy the biodiesel to run the pumps from Zaynagro at 80 shillings a litre.

Farmer Alex Babu Kitheka, 39, said the biodiesel pump permitted him to water a bigger portion of his one-acre plot, where he grows a range 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 earn 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 indicate the plan as a significant benefit in assisting enhance their output.

"The instalment plan is good. Most farmers don't have the cash and can not quickly get a loan to buy a pump like this," stated 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 good which suggests we can settle the expense of the pump slowly in little quantities, and have cash left over to pay the school fees."

Zaynagro's effort is still in its early stages, with few farmers having actually paid back the full cost of the pumps.

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

The simpleness of the design - easy-to-use, robust technology, guaranteed supply of biodiesel integrated with a pay-as-you-go scheme - could help amaze rural Africa, he said.

"There is a mosaic of sustainable energy alternatives in the world. The key problem is checking ideas and techniques in a collective style," said Sanyal.

"Other cotton ginning factories in the region ought to try and find out from this experiment. Banks ought to begin exploring with loans to groups of farmers. International donors and investors need 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, females's and LGBT+ rights, human trafficking, property rights and environment change. Visit http://news.trust.org)