Opportunities for the productive use of rainfall normally lost to cropping for temporal and spatial reasons
1988
Perrier, E.R.
The use of supplemental irrigation and water harvesting farming can alleviate climatic risk factors in arid and semi-arid regions by increasing choices for soil and crop management, which in turn can stabilize crop-water requirements and, therefore, yields. The analysis of rainfall and evapotranspiration data shows that variability is a constraint to agronomic production, but the potential for system design to control drought is within manageable limits. Analyses show that with systematic conservation, surplus water from wet years could be made available during dry periods or drought years. Water harvesting to maximize or minimize runoff is a stabilizing factor for farming systems which depend on natural precipitation. Runoff can be used directly on cultivated fields or stored in soil, or used with supplemental irrigation when stored in excavated ponds or small check dams. Infrastructural parameters required in the support environment when supplemental irrigation and water harvesting farming are implemented must be evaluated if changes are to succeed.
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