Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
than that of the surface water sources. The irrigation system often suffers due to inad-
equate supply of surface water and depends upon groundwater sources as an alterna-
tive to supplement to surface water to stabilize the irrigation.
1.4 RESULTS FROM FIELD STUDIES
1.4.1 GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE FARM HOUSEHOLDS
The general characteristics of the sample farm households were analyzed to observe
any significant changes in land holdings, cropped area, irrigated area due to the in-
troduction of drip irrigation. For this purpose, the drip adopters were compared with
the control households. It was observed that the average size of holding among the
drip adopters was significantly larger than the nonadopters in control village. Since
drip method of irrigation involves huge initial investment, large farmers adopt widely
when compared to small and marginal farmers (Table 2).
It is argued that drip irrigation increases cropped area and area under irrigation as
it is a viable water saving technology. Our study confi rms the earlier fi ndings that the
drip irrigation technology increased the net sown area, net irrigated area and there-by
helps in achieving higher cropping intensity and irrigation intensity. For instance, the
net sown area is increased from 13.27 hectares to 14.49 hectares whereas the gross
cropped area increased from 13.71 hectares to 14.91 hectares (Table 2). Similarly the
net irrigated area and gross irrigated area also increased after drip adoption. During
the survey, we found that drip irrigation technology resulted in signifi cant impacts.
Being an effi cient water saving technology, it helps in expanding the irrigated area and
saving water.
The details regarding before drip adoption was collected based on the recall basis.
For control villages, the reference period for the preadoption was considered to be 10
years before, that is, 1995.
TABLE 2
General Characteristics of sample households, 2007-2008.
Particulars
Drip adopters
Non-adopters
Before
After
Before
After
Number of farm households
50
50
Number of workers in the household (Number)
2.0
2.0
2.52
2.52
Farm size (Hectares)
16.54***
16.54
5.06
5.06
Net sown area (Hectares)
13.27***
14.49
4.66
4.66
Gross cropped area (Hectares)
13.71***
14.91
4.66
4.66
Cropping intensity (%)
a
102.04**
101.82
100.00
100.00
Net irrigated area (Hectares)
13.17***
14.41
4.57
4.57
Gross irrigated area (Hectares)
13.67***
14.85
4.57
4.57
Irrigation intensity (%)
b
102.30
101.88
100.00
100.00
Percentage of area irrigated by wells to the total
cropped area (%)
99.82
99.74
97.53
97.53
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