The effect of various irrigation technologies and strategies on water resources management

Abstract

Today, the uncontrolled abstraction of surface water and groundwater resources has created adverse consequences, which include: extinction of living organisms, land subsidence, salinity of coastal aquifers, increased pumping energy. Therefore, the need to manage available water resources is felt more than ever. Among the various water uses (agriculture, drinking, and industry), agriculture accounts for the bulk of water consumption. Due to the climate change and the growing population, determining the appropriate strategy and technology for irrigation is necessary. In the current study, a simulation model is used to numerically simulate the dynamics of daily soil moisture during the potato crop growing season and to estimate crop production and economic benefits. For climatic data, daily observations of a meteorological station have been used. Results and analyses have been presented for all cases of micro and traditional irrigation methods and agricultural management strategies of non-stress irrigation, low irrigation, and rainfed cultivation. The results showed that in the non-stress irrigation method, crop production and net profit are almost equal in both traditional and micro methods. In the low irrigation method, microtechnology has made crop production and net profit 1.75 times more than traditional technology, which indicates the impact of irrigation technology on crop production.