Efficient Irrigation Decision-Making with the Use of Soil Tensiometers: A Case Study in the Maltese islands

Abstract

The Maltese islands face challenges of water scarcity owing to a lack of rainfall and limited water resources (RDP 2021). The main sources of water for agriculture in Malta come from the mean sea-level aquifer, the perched aquifer, rainwater harvesting, and treated sewage effluent. However, most of these are dependent on precipitation which is another problem in itself due to the scarcity of rainfall in more recent years. Although soil tensiometers have been in use in agriculture for decades, in Malta there is no evidence of their use. Research was done on the potato crop variety Cara which was divided into two groups: the control which was irrigated by observation of the crop and soil, and the experimental group which was irrigated using soil tensiometers. The irrigation volume was recorded for each group and, during harvesting, the weight and number of tubers were recorded. This experiment demonstrated that the water use efficiency can be improved with the use of soil tensiometers and that the application of soil tensiometers in potato cultivation can reduce the amount of water consumed whilst attaining good yields.