Gakutlo is a village with a population of about 1200 inhabitants. The main source of living here is pastoral and arable farming with government senior citizens subsidy to augment with food handouts. There are no industries or sources of formal employment in this village except for a primary school, clinic, local administration office and agricultural extension office.

This area receives around 500 mm of rainfall annually, and the rainfall is erratic and unreliable. The area experiences some droughts. The situation is not being helped by climate change which is making rainfall scarcity even worse. Climate change make rainfed arable farming less productive consequently leading to food shortage at household levels. However, with relatively cheap technology rainwater can be harvested and stored for use when the need arises. The harvested rainfall can also be used for watering backyard gardens at household levels. It is therefore the purpose of this project to enable the financially disadvantaged members of this community to produce vegetables at household level, with the potential to sell excess produce and hence wealth creation. This is also in line with government policy to encourage people to have backyard gardens to improve food security. Vegetables are important in that they will improve the nutrition of the community especially those suffering from HIV/AIDS. Sold excess vegetables will pave way for sustainable livelihood and possible wealth creation.

Roof water harvesting envisages proper channeling of water from the roof to the storage facility and not letting it runoff on the ground. It is this prevention of ground runoff that will lower if not totally eliminate the risk of soil erosion which degrades the environment. The rainwater harvested from the roof will be used for watering the backyard vegetable gardens using a low-head drip irrigation system. A planning grant of USD 2000 was used to facilitate community awareness and appreciation of the roof water harvesting project. The grant was also used to carry out a needs assessment/socio economic survey in Gakuto. The results of the survey did indicate that there is a need for water in Gakuto and that there is need for establishing backyard gardens. The detailed results of the socio-economic survey can be found in the Planning Grant report. The project is envisaged to run for 1.5 years as outlined in the implementation schedule. The major anticipated project outputs are improved diet at household level and some degree of poverty reduction by possible income generation from sold vegetables. The entire project will cost about US$ 26 087-60 (or BWP 200230.80) to implement.