Abstract
Water is a vital resource to sustain civilizations and pecuniary development and most importantly agriculture. Agriculture is the main contributor to the Ethiopian economy. The field experiment was conducted at Werer Agricultural Research center to evaluate the effects of drip and furrow irrigation under different irrigation levels on maize water use efficiency. The experiment was laid out in an RCBD split-plot arrangement where drip and furrow irrigations were assigned as the main plot and irrigation levels (100, 85, 70, and 55% of ETc) were assigned in the subplot arrangement with three blocks. The highest seasonal water requirement of maize was 701.7 mm at 100% ETc under conventional furrow irrigation which is considered as control while the lowest was 321.6 mm at 55% ETc under alternative furrow irrigation. The interaction effects of irrigation systems and irrigation levels have shown a highly significant (p<0.01) effect on water use efficiency. The highest (2.38 kg/m3) and the lowest (0.60kg/m3) water use efficiency were recorded from the plots treated with drip irrigation at 100% ETc and conventional furrow irrigation at 100% ETc treatments, respectively. In terms of water use efficiency and economic prominence, irrigating with a drip irrigation system with 100% ETc can be recommended for the production of maize in the study area. Key words: Agriculture, efficiency, irrigation, main plot, split plot.
Highlights
The uniformity in distributing water in soil with alternative furrow surface irrigation is mainly associated with the soil and field condition and implementation of the process of regular irrigation (Kashiani et al, 2011)
Effects of irrigations system and irrigation levels on yield parameters and grain yield production of maize are significantly influenced by irrigation system in combination with different irrigation level
The highest water use efficiency was obtained from drip irrigation with 85%ETc (2.38 kg/m3) and minimum obtained from Conventional furrow irrigation (0.60 kg/m3)
Summary
The uniformity in distributing water in soil with alternative furrow surface irrigation is mainly associated with the soil and field condition and implementation of the process of regular irrigation (Kashiani et al, 2011). Holding the current rates of agricultural water use efficiency constant, an estimated additional amount of 5700 km of freshwater will be required annually to meet the estimated food demand in 2050 (Rost et al, 2009). The advance of water-saving technologies in the agricultural sector can alleviate the risk of water shortage. To cope up with periods of water shortage, efficient use of irrigation water is becoming increasingly important, and water-saving agriculture is an important option.
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
