Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
as volumes utilisable to increase the irrigated area
(G column), the total irrigated surface could rise to 553228 hectares, with an average
relative increase of 17, 6 %, and the yearly infrastructure investment could decrease to
1181
Considering the total
+,-
/ha.
In conclusion, the European Mediterranean Countries the full utilisation of the
available water and the optimisation of water use in agriculture is a key factor in social-
rural development and agri-environment management. The definition of an index on
water use efficiency in agriculture is a key element in the optimisation of water resources
management.
The present work gives the baseline information to evaluate the efficiency in
irrigation water use.
The IEff index allows to determine the additional water wasted in an irrigation area,
on the basis of the irrigation suitability of the land use/soil/irrigation technique system.
After a first analysis of the wastewater and infrastructures investment costs, two main
considerations:
"#
Farmers pay a unitary water cost that is generally far away from the real cost; this also
considering that infrastructural investment are completely founded by the public works
and are not included in water costs; the low irrigation water cost compensates farm
irrigation waterworks yearly costs, particularly significant for the drop systems;
The low water cost contributes to an inefficient agricultural water use; the perfect
evaluation of the real/optimal crop water requirement will allow the farmer to pay water
at least on the basis of the real volumes of irrigation, or to reduce the unitary water
volumes.
A new research project started from this experience is now developing new
methodologies and quantitative methods in order to define the optimal crop water
requirement.
The available data regarding the irrigated areas are structured in geographic layers,
with an information system with the possibility to query and aggregate information at
geographic level.
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