Greener Journal of Agricultural Sciences

Greener Journal of  Agricultural Sciences Vol. 2 (4), pp. 108-129, August 2012

 ISSN: 2276-7770 

Review Paper

Manuscript Number:JPAS11-018

 

Ways to Maximize the Water Use Efficiency in Field Crops – A review

 

*Avtar Singh, Navneet Aggarwal, Gurpreet Singh Aulakh and R. K. Hundal

 

Department of Agronomy, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana-141004, India.

 

*Corresponding Author’s Email: avtar_bimbraw @ yahoo. com

Abstract:

Yields of field crops in Indo-Gangetic plains of India have decreased due to the advent of increasing water scarcity in this century. The water is a very limiting input in this region for the crop production; its efficiency is quite low in the range 30–40 per cent, thereby about 60–70 per cent of irrigation water is lost during conveyance and application. Irrigation farming, the greatest water user of all, has been made responsible for inefficient water use. There is also not available new land for agriculture to meet the demand of ever increasing population in terms of food and clothing. On the other hand, irrigation farming more and more has to compete with other interests for dwindling resources in water. Therefore, there is need to increase the yields and water use efficiency in water limited environments. Thus, this review will focus on the various water economization practices, irrigation scheduling based on consumptive pan evaporative, land configuration, selection of crop, varieties, intercropping, moisture conservation practices, use vegetative barriers, use of transpiration suppressants according to the availability of water. In this article is also discussed the ecological aspect of water, depletion of groundwater resources, the concept of water use efficiency, need to improve the water use efficiency, factors to enhancing the water use efficiency which will help to sustain the resources of water and productivity of crops. This review article would be useful to convey the importance to work out the water use efficiency to indentify the efficient management practices, crop varieties/hybrids to get the higher productivity with the availability of water. With good management and adoption of appropriate practices improved agricultural water conservation and subsequent use of that water for more efficient crop production are possible under both dry land and irrigated area.
 
 Key Words: Indo-Gangetic Plains, Water use efficiency, Practices, Crop production, Water.

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