Predicting the impacts of water management policies under uncertainty can support policy-makers in making sound decisions. Most previous methods for policy-impact simulation lacked a calibration process that would allow model results to match observed values, and did not address the inherent uncertainties. To fill this methodological knowledge gap, an interval credibility-constrained positive mathematical

Date palm (Phoenix dactylifera L.) growth and production in the arid regions is adversely affected by increasing soil and water salinities. Although many aspects of date palm nutrition, physiology, genetics, and many more are extensively researched, the evaluation of salinity impact on date palm growth and productivity are limited to short duration studies and/or focused mostly on the seedling stage

Nitrogen loss from tea orchards in the Three Gorges Reservoir Area (TGRA) will increase the risk of eutrophication in reservoir surrounding bodies of water. However, runoff and nitrogen loss from tea orchard slopes in response to rainstorm patterns have been rarely reported，especially on the interflow process. The study was conducted using simulated slopes containing soil collected from the slopes

Different types of the Crop Water Stress Index (CWSI) have been useful for water stress monitoring and irrigation management in semi-arid regions, however little research exists on its effective application in humid regions. This study aims to assess the effectiveness of three CWSI models (CWSIe - empirical, CWSIt - theoretical, CWSIh - hybrid) for crop water stress monitoring in an experimental field

The digitalization of the agricultural sector through the implementation of cutting-edge technologies allows for the optimization of the use of water, whose scarcity has become one of the most relevant and complex environmental global problems. Water consumption data collected on site using different technologies is key to achieving optimal irrigation scheduling. Technology is also a useful tool that

This study presents a credibility-based interval multi-objective crop area planning model for agricultural and ecological management under uncertainty. The model is developed through the integrations of interval multi-objective programming and fuzzy credibility-constrained programming by considering economic and ecological benefits of the study system, and dealing with interval and fuzzy uncertainties

Knowledge of water use efficiency (WUE) at the ecosystem level is imperative as it is a critical ecophysiological index reflecting the coupling processes between carbon sequestration and water consumption. However, the temporal patterns of WUE and their underlying regulating factors during different seasons in tea plantations, which are under intense pruning practice, remain poorly understood. Based

Management of water resources is essential to maintain sustainable agricultural productivity and preserve groundwater and surface ecosystems. The long-term sustainability of these systems depends on the understanding of complex surface-groundwater flow interactions at different temporal and spatial scales, and the impacts of agricultural practices on water use. To support these efforts, an integrated

The ridge-furrow plastic mulching system has been reported to increase crop yield and water-nitrogen use efficiency in semi-arid and semi-humid regions, but the effects of plant density, nitrogen (N) rate and supplemental irrigation on chlorophyll, photosynthesis, root growth and seed yield of soybean under ridge-furrow plastic mulching are poorly understood. A two-year field experiment (2019 and 2020)

Higher water efficiency and higher carbon efficiency are important goals of sustainable agricultural development. However, long-term rotary tillage has a negative impact on soil, resulting in a reduction of soil water availability, and an increasing severity of water shortage for crop production. In addition to which China faces a sharp increase in global carbon emissions (CE), which are likely to

Fresh water is a limited global resource. Water scarcity footprints (WSF) have been developed to guide the choices of consumers and supply chains to reduce unsustainable fresh water consumption. The Available WAter REmaining (AWARE) method, which is the only method to have gained global consensus, assigns WSF for a commodity or product relative to the scarcity of water in the catchment in which production

Agriculture in Atlantic Canada (AC) is dominated by a rain-fed potato production system, with potatoes typically rotating with cereal crops such as barley and oats. Under rain-fed conditions, crop yields are sensitive to weather and its variations and are thus affected by climate change. Previous research regarding climate change impacts on crop yields in AC has been limited to a regional-scale assessment

Olive trees are considered among the most resilient crops in Mediterranean basin. However, prolonged water stress may adversely affect plant productivity and quality of fruits and oil. Therefore, it is essential to design new agronomic strategies to improve plant water stress tolerance and secure yield and product stability of this important agricultural crop. Under water deficit, plants cope with

Agrivoltaic systems (AVS) are emerging mixed production systems where crops are cultivated below the photovoltaic (PV) panels. This study investigated the effects of different PV shading levels on kiwifruit growth, yield and water productivity (WPc), with three densities of 19.0% (T1), 30.4% (T2) and 38.0% (T3) of translucent PV panels installed on the South-oriented AVS roof. The AVS perimeter was

Sufficient freshwater is needed for water dependent sectors such as agriculture, nature, drinking water, and industry. However, even in low-lying, flood prone countries like the Netherlands, climate change, weather extremes, economic growth, urbanization, land subsidence and increased food production will make it more complex to guarantee sufficient freshwater for all sectors. Furthermore, the frequency

Capturing and reusing fertigation drainage is a key strategy for maximizing greenhouse production efficiency while minimizing the impact of wastewater discharge on receiving ecosystems. Fertigation drainage, in this regard, refers to irrigation water mixed with fertilizer that has once passed through soilless culture. Although an economically and environmentally prudent practice, recirculating fertigation

In arid and semi-arid regions, water scarcity and soil salinization are major factors impacting sustainable agricultural production. In this study, a macroscopic root-water-uptake model was used to adapt a plant water deficit index (PWDI) for irrigation scheduling under conditions of coexisting soil water and salinity stress-causing factors. The traditional approach, estimating PWDI with average root

Beef production is one of the largest water consumers of all food production systems, but there are substantial knowledge gaps about the accounting and interpretation of its freshwater consumption. Moreover, hardly any study has assessed the freshwater fluxes related to beef cattle in integrated crop-livestock (ICL) and crop-livestock-forestry (ICLF) systems. We aimed at quantifying the freshwater

Volumetric soil water content (VSWC) monitoring is an important aspect of environmental monitoring of farmland. Accurate and real-time determination of the VSWC is important for crop drought stress diagnosis and smart irrigation. Image technology is commonly used in agricultural information technology. Based on image technology, we simulated the optimal frequency of the sensors to automatically collect

Climate change will increase the frequency and intensity of drought in water-scarce agricultural areas that rely on irrigation. The increased strain on finite water resources for irrigated agriculture will cause a shift from sprinkler and flood irrigation to micro-irrigation. Micro-irrigation results in complex 3-dimensional salinity patterns. Current field-scale apparent soil electrical conductivity

A shortcoming of the RZ-SHAW model (A hybrid version of Root Zone Water Quality Model and The Simultaneous Heat and Water Model) is that it cannot simulate the plastic mulching technology which is widely used in arid areas. Our objectives in this study were to develop RZ-SHAW to include a new plastic module, and to evaluate the model’s performance over three years of maize (Zea mays L.) production

Solving the disparity between rainwater supply and crop water demand is a fundamental issue in semiarid rainfed agriculture. Over the last decades, the ridge-furrow-plastic-mulching (RFM) farming system has been widely used as an on-site (in-situ) rain-harvesting farming strategy, providing a partial solution to the supply-demand mismatch of rainwater. The off-site rain-harvesting system (ex-situ water

Drought is the leading cause of low and unstable wheat yield in dryland. The field experiment was performed from 2009 to 2017 in the eastern part of Loess Plateau, China, to study the effect of tillage (deep ploughing, DP and no-tillage, NT) and seasonal variation in precipitation on soil moisture and root traits and grain yield of wheat. In dry seasons, soil water content, root length surface density

Brackish water drip irrigation (BWDI) is an effective application to overcome the water scarcity issues and achieve sustainable agriculture development. However, emitter clogging and soil salinization is inevitable issue in BWDI, eventually threatening the environmental pollution and sustainable application of drip irrigation systems. Therefore, this study experimentally assessed the anti-clogging

Waterlogging is a major threat to wheat following rice production in the Yangtze River Plain, China, where the raised-bed planting (RBP) pattern is recommended to reduce yield losses from waterlogging. Furrows used in RBP allow drainage runoff, and beds serve as planting zones. However, the optimal bed widths for wheat following rice cultivation are unknown. To adopt the most effective RBP patterns

Canopy interception (Ic) of rainwater is an important component of hydrological cycles, and its measurement and modeling are essential for understanding water balances and formulating scientific strategies of management in different ecosystems. Large areas of traditional agricultural crops have been replaced with apple orchards in the Yellow River Basin, while few studies were conducted to quantify

Soil mulching, e.g. straw mulching (SM) and ridge-furrow plastic film mulching (RP), has been reported to promote rainfed crop production in semi-arid regions, but its applicability in improving maize yield and especially yield stability in semi-humid drought-prone regions has been rarely explored. The capture and utilization of thermal, light, water and nutrients resources by maize plants under various

Land degradation is one of the world’s most pressing environmental problems and a constraint to agricultural production. Application of diverse organic amendments provides a management strategy to compensate for soil organic carbon depletion and reduce land degradation. The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of different organic amendments on soil properties, crop growth and water-fertilizer

The Gnangara groundwater system is Western Australia’s most important groundwater resource, but it is being depleted. Although Australia has been at the forefront of establishing water markets, Western Australia has been slow to adopt legislation that would support trade in groundwater. This study explores the impact of introducing groundwater trading within the horticulture sector for farms that extract

Water scarcity and deficiency of trace elements (e.g., Cu and Mn) in soils of arid and semi-arid areas are major constrains to crop growth and development. The application of brackish water drip irrigation system (BWDIs), coupled with trace elements, is probably an effective way to solve this problem. However, fouling problems caused by trace elements in BWDIs were inevitable. Therefore, this paper

Water is one of the important environmental factors affecting the quality and quantity of Rosa × damascena Herrm. essential oil. This study aimed to evaluate and compare the quality, quantity, and antibacterial/antifungal activity of R. × Damascena essential oil in fields under irrigation treatments such as treated wastewater and well water at the University of Kashan, Kashan, Iran. In each field,

Declining water tables and shrinking irrigation supply are two major challenges for agricultural production that increase production costs of high delta crops in Pakistan. Crop producers may tackle these threats by optimizing the use of available resources. To devise policies for improved resource use and cost reduction, assessing current efficiency levels and their determinants can provide useful

Characterizing soil heterogeneity helps to improve the management of the natural resources (mainly water, nutrients and soil itself) at the farm level and enhances crop growth and relative yield sustainability. In this context, the geophysical monitoring based on direct current methods (such as the Electrical Resistivity Tomography, ERT) can help to detect the soil heterogeneity by exploring the soil

This paper investigates the impact of erratic rainfall and related water problems on agricultural productivity. The paper also aims to shed light on the conceptual importance of understanding the incidence and impacts of rainfall shocks for choosing feasible agricultural water risk management strategies both at household and policy levels. To achieve these goals we develop a conceptual framework, use

Deficit and erratic precipitation in arid regions and imbalance nitrogen (N) fertilization can result in lower yield and nutritional quality of fodder maize. The objectives of the experiment were to investigate the effect of N (urea 46% N) rates i.e., 225 (N1), 300 (N2) and 375 kg N ha–1 (N3) under 600 (W1) and 900 mm ha–1 (W2) supplemental irrigation levels on the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, yield

Subsurface tile drainage is recognized as a significant source of sediment and particulate phosphorus (PP) in the midwestern U.S. However, the role of subsurface flow pathway and source water connectivity dynamics on sediment transport is poorly understood. The overarching objective of this study was to investigate sediment and PP loading dynamics for a midwestern subsurface tile drained agroecosystem

Due to the shortage of water for irrigation, brewery wastewater is currently used as a source of irrigation for crops in developing countries including Ethiopia. However, there is little information about the influence of brewery wastewater on soil properties, crop nutrients and productivity in Ethiopia. Thus, this study was conducted to investigate the effect of brewery wastewater on soil physical

While many studies on zebra chip (ZC) disease in potatoes have focused on the epidemiology of the disease and the characterization of infected potato plants, this study quantifies the impact of ZC disease on crop response and investigates the relationship between irrigation level and ZC disease severity. In this two-year study chipping potatoes were planted under a variable rate irrigation center pivot

Snow and glaciers provide water to the densely populated downstream area of the Tarim River Basin, which is an important irrigated agricultural area in China. Cotton is an important cash crop, and meltwater is an important irrigation water source for cotton in this region. In this study, the spatiotemporal dependence of cotton yield on mountain meltwater resources in the subbasins of the Tarim River

The rapid population growth and economic development, climate change and irregular rainfall will inevitably intensify the competition of water resources, resulting in the reduction of agricultural irrigation water. In recent years, subsurface drip irrigation (SSDI), as an efficient water-saving irrigation technology, has been widely used in crop production, but its effects on crop yield, irrigation

After an extreme rainy event agricultural fields can be submerged by water. Stagnant water can be generated by river’ flooding or by soil saturation causing different damage level to crops. In this work, the flood event occurred on 3rd October 2020 in NW Italy along the Sesia river was assessed with special concern about damages affecting rice crop fields. A method was proposed aimed at detecting flooded

Understanding the agro-hydrological processes and water productivity of canal- and well-irrigated systems is vital for agricultural water management in arid regions. In this study, the Agro-Hydrological & chemical and Crop systems simulator (AHC) was used in a distributed manner to evaluate the agro-hydrological processes and to assess water productivity under the conditions of canal- and well-irrigated

The integrated Structure-Actor-Water framework (iSAW) was used to develop a set of indicators to select an irrigation system according to its sustainability impact on agriculture. The analysis hierarchical process (AHP) was used to explore the views of 60 agricultural water stakeholders, such as specialists, extension experts, agricultural NGO staff, and farmers across Ardabil Province in Iran. Participants

Water shortage and poor soil fertility are the main factors restricting the sustainable development of peanut production in semi-arid areas of Northeast China. It is thus essential to have a deep understanding of the soil water-nitrogen dynamics and crop water/nitrogen use for developing water and nutrient strategies. Three levels of irrigation treatment (W65, 65% of field capacity; W55, 55% of field

Climate change, growing populations, and increasing wealth are increasing demand for food, energy, and water. Additionally, water stress is expected to increase in the future in areas with high rates of seasonality of precipitation, due to increased variability in precipitation. One approach to limiting the impact of climate change on food system productions is through the intensive and extensive expansion

Determination of crop evapotranspiration (ETc) and root zone soil-water dynamics/distribution coupled with nitrogen (N) management strategies is important for effective management of agricultural fields for enhancing production efficiency. However, limited data and knowledge exist that sufficiently inform how soil-water dynamics and ETc response may vary with coupled irrigation levels and different

This study aimed at the evaluation of the change in the effectiveness of Best Management Practices (BMPs) for agricultural pollution control in terms of reduction of nutrient loads to surface water bodies in Lithuania in the context of climate change (CC). The SWAT model was used by applying two CC representative concentration pathways (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5), three time horizons (historical – 2000–2019

Globally, the agricultural sector is the largest consumer of fresh water, despite the increased efficiency in irrigation. Remote sensing is a valuable tool to monitor agricultural water use. In this study, we demonstrate a novel algorithm that computes high-resolution (10 m) remote sensing-based evapotranspiration (ET) data linked exclusively to irrigation, i.e. the incremental evapotranspiration (ETincr)

Soil moisture of maize has an extremely important impact on the growth and development of maize. Failure to accurately estimate soil moisture will lead to severe reductions in maize yields and thus intensify the global food crisis, so it is extremely important to accurately estimate soil moisture of maize. This study proposes a new hybrid machine learning model (SVM-SWOA) that incorporates the Whale

Increasing the saffron quantity and quality is essential and should be considered to achieve the desired performance. In this regard, to study the effect of nutrient and irrigation management on the quality and yield of saffron, an experiment was carried out at the research station, the Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Iran, in 2013–2015. The study was performed as a split-split plot based on a Randomized