How Surface Irrigation Contributes to Climate Change Resilience—A Case Study of Practices in Mexico

Abstract

Climate change has brought increased temperatures and decreased rainfall on a global scale; however, population growth requires greater volumes of water and food each year that must be supplied in one way or another. In Mexico, application efficiencies in gravity irrigation are below 50%. Although in recent years the decision has been made to change to pressurized irrigation systems to increase the efficiency of water use, border or furrow irrigation is still the most widely used in agriculture. In this work, we show that with a methodology developed and applied in these systems, application efficiencies greater than 90% were obtained, while the Water Use Efficiency (WUE) increased by 27, 38 and 47% for the three crops where it was applied: sorghum, barley, and corn, respectively. Irrigation times per hectare and applied irrigation depths decreased by more than 30%, representing increased irrigation efficiencies and WUE. Finally, the water savings obtained can mitigate water scarcity in cities.

Evaluation and Development of Pedotransfer Functions and Artificial Neural Networks to Saturation Moisture Content Estimation

“…The bulk density was determined by the cylinder method of known volume, the soil texture by the mesh analysis and the Bouyoucos hydrometer [46], the initial water content through a TDR 300 soil moisture meter, and field capacity (−33 kPa) and permanent wilting point (−1500 kPa) were measured in a pressure plate [47], while K s was obtained by the variable head permeameter method. The measurement of variables and the hydrodynamic characterization of soils are widely discussed in [48,49].…”

A soil database from Queretaro, Mexico for assessment of crop and irrigation water requirements

“…According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) textural triangle the soil can be classified into 12 different textures according to the percentages of sand (Sa), silt (Si) and clay (Cl) in each soil sample 4 . The water infiltration rate in each type of soil is completely different and knowing its value is of fundamental importance for the correct design of pressurized irrigation systems 5 – 8 or the optimal irrigation discharge calculation to be supplied in each border or furrow 9 – 14 .…”