Groundwater Contamination from Agro-chemicals in Irrigated Environment : Field Trials

Abstract

This paper highlights on the increasing fears that chemicals in agriculture have found their way into drinking water causing health complications. In fact, many chemicals have not had these effects but waiting to do so by moving into groundwater, sinking slowly and finally going into taps. Nitrate fertilizer is largely blamed for these fears. Use of fertilizer obviously would increase manifold to meet the food needs arising out of population explosion and it would further aggravate the situation. Therefore, the use of chemicals in agriculture presents a global alarm particularly for Pakistan where environmental degradation is rampant and unfortunately least attended. It necessitates development of Best Management Practices (BMP’s) to reduce groundwater contamination resulting from application of agricultural chemicals especially the fertilizer. The study conducted at the University of Agriculture for reducing fertilizer pollution of groundwater is presented in this article.