WATER USE EFFICIENCY IN DIFFERENT CROPS CULTIVATION: A STUDY OF BORE-WELL OWNING FARMERS FROM SOUTH INDIA

Abstract

Due to increased water scarcity, many new programmes have been introduced in the recent years to increase the water use efficiency in India agriculture, which consumes over 85 percent of the available water. One important question often asked in the context of water use is whether the water is used efficiently in different crops. This study makes an attempt to estimate the water use efficiency of three water-intensive crops namely curry banana, sugarcane and paddy which are cultivated using groundwater irrigation. The study was carried out using field survey data collected from Sivagangai district of Tamil Nadu, India. Multiple regression analysis has been used to find out as to how efficiently water is used in impacting the value of output of the selected crops. The study found that irrigation water productivity and water use efficiency were higher for sugarcane crop. But, in terms of profitability and economic water productivity, curry banana crop cultivation seems to be more efficient. Sugarcane seems to be an efficient crop in terms of water productivity, but curry banana appears to be an efficient in terms of economic water productivity.