Improving groundwater resource accounting in irrigated areas : a prerequisite for promoting sustainable use

Abstract

This article has a fundamental underlying concern—that programmes to improve agricultural productivity through the introduction of modern irrigation technology are frequently making the false assumption that increasing ‘irrigation (water) efficiency’ alone will benefit, or at least not compromise, groundwater resource sustainability (Foster et al. 2000; 2002). Quite widely, the agricultural development sector promotes major (multi-million dollar/euro) investments in irrigation technology in part as a simple panacea to reverse the continuous decline of water tables, widely observed in more drought-prone agricultural areas of the developing world. This false paradigm is all too often accepted, rather than challenged, by practising hydrogeologists working on groundwater resource development and management in these areas. The main objective of this article is to highlight (and to provide a ready-reference to) this major policy issue for the groundwater community, because of the importance of the current global dialogue on ‘water for food production’—and to indicate a way of viewing the water balance of irrigated permeable soils that provides a sounder basis for managing the groundwater resourceirrigated agriculture nexus. Groundwater resource-irrigated agriculture linkages