Irrigation Installation

Our syntropic agroforestry system is unique in that we are integrating both dry and irrigated species. We have a alnternating lines of olives that dont need irrigation, with lines of almonds, avocados, citrus and moringa that do need irrigation.

We also have the added benefit of having a retention pond on site. Using funding from the most recent Regen Coordination grant from Gitcoin 23 we were able to both purchase the material for the installation including tubes, pipes, and fittings, but also pay for the rental of the excavator and paid labor for installation.

Overall we were able to install 3 zones covering 3 kilometers of tree beds. The water is pumped from the retention pond to a 10 ,000 liter cistern at the top of the property and which then uses a combination of gravity and electric pump to move the water through the field. The system can move 8000 liters every hour.

The hardest work was manually weeding the tree line to precisely place the irrigation tubes at the base of the trees to ensure the roots receive water. This was one of the biggest investments in the farm and we hope it pays off in the coming years so our tropical trees can survive the hot dry Sicilian summers.

Furthermore we now have an example of reticulating system that doesn't use well water for irrigation giving a working solution to recharge the groundwater and efficiently irrigate agroforestry systems to ensure water resilience.