Sub-surface drip fertigation for enhanced resource-use efficiency and profitability

Abstract

Unchecked population expansion and growing climate change-induced vulnerabilities in India and around the world are making the problem of water scarcity severer with each passing year. The nation's food bowl, the Indo-Gangetic plains region of India, has serious issues, such as groundwater depletion, low water productivity, inefficient water-use, nutrient deficiencies, and inefficient nutrient utilization. About 70% of the water used on Earth is used for agriculture, making it the biggest user of the freshwater supply, leaving little for other industrial uses. Conventional ways of applying irrigation water, such as flooding, result in poor water application; irrigation efficiency is about 35–40%, and water productivity is low, which affects long-term food security. In areas with limited water resources, sub-surface drip irrigation offers an alternative to precisely applying irrigation water. Because it makes it simple to apply water and nutrients to crops, increasing the efficiency of water and nutrient use, and thus, need to be popularized among the producers. Subsurafce drip fertigation can boost nutrient and water-use efficiency (WUE) to 80% and 90%, respectively. In order to solve the problems of poor irrigation efficiency and water productivity and simultaneously increase the productivity of cereal-based cropping systems in a sustainable way, the most efficient water and nutrient management technique is discussed in the current article.