By Sebastian Rodriguez
HOJANCHA, Costa Rica, May 11 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Farmers everywhere know water means life, and a lack of it can spell ruin. In Hojancha, a canton that lies about 130 kilometres (80 miles) west of the Costa Rican capital San Jose, cattle farmer Manuel Rojas understands that as well as anyone.
Normally by this time of year, he said, his small herd of 30 cattle would be desperate for water. Not any longer.
“Now they have it there easily,” he said, pointing to a full drinking trough.
What changed? Last month Rojas installed a rainwater harvest system that, as the name suggests, captures rainwater and stores it in an evaporation-proof, 1,000-cubic-metre tank.
It is one of the country’s first such systems. Its inverted pyramid structure stores 1 million litres of water, enough to last four months if used carefully.
“We hope that this system can help us maintain production throughout the whole year, and not only when it rains,” he said.
Hojancha lies in Guanacaste province, a region on the Pacific coast that is particularly prone to drought, especially during the intense summer months.
This area has few rivers, said Oscar Vasquez, the provincial director at the ministry of agriculture, who was at Rojas’ farm for a ceremony marking the system’s installation.
“I do not see another way (than this). Water comes only from the sky,” he said.
Despite the need for it, though, capturing rain is in its infancy in Costa Rica, he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation, in part because people do not know about the technology.
But there are other reasons, Vasquez said: it is costly to set up, and there is not enough clarity about the law covering rainwater harvesting. Both factors lower the economic incentives for farmers to invest.
