The role of smallholder farmers in multi‐stakeholder innovation platforms and thus in the innovation process that these platforms facilitate is typically limited. The EAU4Food project, aimed at increasing food production in irrigation schemes in Africa through improved farming strategies, used a platform design inspired by the community of practice (CoP) concept, which opened up space for farmers' interactive learning and enabled their active participation in the innovation process. In this article we present examples of how this approach has been implemented in Ethiopia, Mozambique and Tunisia. We analyse the level of farmers' participation that was achieved at different stages of the implementation process, namely: deciding how to set up the CoP, identifying innovation needs and conducting the experiment. Among different strategies deployed by EAU4Food researchers, working with dialogue groups, engaging farmers in data interpretation and passing the responsibility over elements of the research process to farmers, proved to be the most effective in strengthening farmers' involvement. The use of a simulation game to test innovations also showed promising results and should be explored further. The attitude of researchers proved to be an important factor in achieving a high level of farmers' engagement in the project. Copyright © 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Agriculture in developing countries will have to transform and increase production by an estimated 70% in order to meet demands by 2050. Although well‐managed commercial farms offer little manoeuvring space for increasing agricultural water productivity, smallholder farms usually operate at low input costs and therefore provide ample opportunities to reduce the potential yield gap through agricultural intensification. The aim of this paper is to analyse and compare yields and water productivities obtained in field and modelling experiments in Ethiopia (maize, garlic, onion), South Africa (tomato) and Tunisia (tomato, potato, wheat). Innovative agricultural practices were introduced on smallholder farms: irrigation scheduling and NPS Zn fertilization in Ethiopia; high‐yielding cultivar, drip irrigation, mulching and organic amendments in South Africa; and crop water modelling in Tunisia. In general, crop yields increased up to eight times with innovative practices compared to current conventional farming practices. Crop water productivities were fairly stable within the same experiments, but increased with innovations, indicating that intensive farming can be more environmentally sustainable than conventional farming. Intensive farming systems in a resource‐rich environment (high radiation levels, relatively fertile, deep and well‐drained soils), combined with technology transfer and capacity building could be seen as viable strategies to secure food for smallholders and communities in African rural areas, as well as to improve water utilization in water‐scarce catchments. Copyright © 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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Surface irrigation type is one of the most widely used in the world due to its low cost investment. However it is complex method of applying water to soil, because of extreme difficult to achieve good control over the highly variable nature of the movement of water across a soil surface and its infiltration into the soil over a season. This study is attempted to optimize furrow irrigation decision variables at Wonji Shoa sugar estate using field experiment and two simulation models. The field data of experimental site was measured as input for models and simulated using the SIRMOD software and WinSRFR software package. Furrow lengths of 32 m, 48 m and 64 m, slopes of 0.05%, 0.075% and 0.1%and flow rates of 3 l/sec, 4 l/sec and 5 l/sec were analyzed with three replication using volume balance method and two simulation models. The study found optimum decision variables that gave maximum application efficiency and distribution uniformity were slope of 0.1%, furrow length of 32 m and inflow rate of 4 l/sec at cut-off time of 15.79 min. Thus, to improve the performance of furrow irrigation practice, optimal furrow length, inflow rates and cut-off time found by this study should be adopted. Findings from the study would serve as a source of information for use by policy makers and planners during the design and Operation of irrigation development programs. It does not focus on yield related optimization. So, it is open for the future research to conduct yield related optimization of the decision variables.

Surface irrigation type is one of the most widely used in the world due to its low cost investment. However it is complex method of applying water to soil, because of extreme difficult to achieve good control over the highly variable nature of the movement of water across a soil surface and its infiltration into the soil over a season. This study is attempted to optimize furrow irrigation decision variables at Wonji sugar estate using field experiment and two simulation models. The field data of experimental site was measured as input for models and simulated using the SIRMOD software and WinSRFR software package. Furrow lengths of 32m, 48m and 64m, slopes of 0.05%, 0.075% and 0.1%and flow rates of 3l/sec, 4l/sec and 5l/sec were analyzed with three replication using volume balance method and two simulation models. The study found optimum decision variables that gave maximum application efficiency and distribution uniformity were slope of 0.1%, furrow length of 32m and inflow rate of 4 l/sec at cut-off time of 15.79 minutes. Thus, to improve the performance of furrow irrigation practice, optimal furrow length, inflow rates and cut-off time found by this study should be adopted. Findings from the study would serve as a source of information for use by policy makers and planners during the design and Operation of irrigation development programs. It does not focus on yield related optimization. So, it is open for the future research to conduct yield related optimization of the decision variables. The authors sincerely declare that this study is the product of their own efforts.