Crop water productivity towards future sustainable agriculture in Egypt
Date
2009-11
Authors
El Atfy, Hussein, author
Abdin, Alaa E., author
Salem, Shaban, author
U.S. Committee on Irrigation and Drainage, publisher
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Abstract
Water is characterized such as no alternative source can substitute it and it is not a commercial resource or commodity. The great challenge for the coming decades will be the task of increasing food production with less water particularly in basins with limited water resources. Molden et al. (2003) estimated that, by year 2020, approximately 75% of the world's population will live in areas experiencing physical or economic water scarcity. Most of these areas happen to be where most of the poor and food insecure people live. Meeting their food needs with locally produced food presents enormous challenge. Hence, the need is to increase water productivity of agricultural production systems in water scarce areas where the poor population is dependent on local production. Increasing the productivity in agriculture will play a vital role in easing competition for scarce resources, prevention of environmental degradation, and provision of food security. Crop water productivity depends on several factors including crop genetic material, water management practices, economic and policy incentives, and people's acceptance. In a broad sense, productivity of water refers to the benefits derived from the use of water and is most often given in terms of mass of product, or its monetary value, per unit of water. Therefore, the main goal of the current practical study is to assess water productivity for different crops, assist decision makers in developing sustainable agricultural policies for Egypt and maximize national water resources' productivity in different agricultural activities considering the supply and demand aspects and based on the efficient utilization of the water resource.
Description
Presented at the fifth international conference on irrigation and drainage, Irrigation and drainage for food, energy and the environment on November 3-6, 2009 in Salt Lake City, Utah.