Assignment No:1

Topic: Can we use sprinkler

or Drip Irrigation on salt
effected soils.
Soil salinity is a major global issue owing to its adverse
impact on agricultural productivity and sustainability. Salinity
problems occur under all climatic conditions and can result
from both natural and human-induced actions. Generally
speaking, saline soils occur in arid and semi-arid regions
where rainfall is insufficient to meet the water requirements
of the crops, and leach mineral salts out of the root-zone.
The practice of irrigation, if not planned and managed
properly, can result in increased soil salinization.

Drip Irrigation:
Drip irrigation system can supply the required quantity of
water to the crop on a daily or periodic basis. Drip irrigation
delivers water near each plant through pipes (usually plastic)
and a series of closely spaced emitters (drippers). This
leads to high water use efficiency. The flow rate of each
dripper can be controlled from 1 to 4 + liters per hour. The
use of drippers for application of poor quality water may give
better crop yields due to an ability to maintain high soil
moisture levels and replenish the water lost by ET on a daily
basis. Drip irrigation is often preferred to sprinkler irrigation
for species with a high sensitivity to leaf necrosis. However,
because the diameters of the dripper openings are quite
small, the evaporation of saline water at the end of the
dripper opening can lead to clogging, whichreduces (or
completely stops) the discharge of irrigation water from
individual drippers. Thus, drippers must be inspected
periodically to prevent this problem. In drip irrigation, salt
accumulation occurs via twoprocesses.
First, the soil becomes saturated with saline water and
solutes are spread throughout the soil, saturating
neighboring voids. In the second process, which occurs
between consecutive irrigation cycles, both evaporation of
water from the soil and the uptake of water and nutrients by
plants are occurring. Solutes, thus, become redistributed in
the soil with a final buildup

of salts resulting from the interaction of these two processes

throughout the crop season. During drip irrigation, salts will
concentrate below the soil surface along the perimeters of
the expanding wetting soil zone. Prolonged soil drying, or
interspersing long intervals between irrigation cycles, can
lead to increasingly saline soil-water movement back
towards the plant, thereby increasing the likelihood of plant
damage. This can be managed by ensuring that irrigation
volumes are sufficient to allow the movement of new
irrigation water to always be away from the drippers. Salts
concentrate through water evaporation from the soil and also
by plant uptake. As discussed above, salt accumulation
occurs on the boundaries of the wetted soil volume, with the
lowest salt concentration occurring in the immediate vicinity
of the water source . Salt concentrations will be the highest
at the soil surface, and in the very center of any two drippers,
i.e. at the boundary of the volume of wetted soil. Special
care must be exercised to avoid the negative effects of salts
to plants, especially during light rains that can push the salts
from the center of drip lines towards plants and into the root-
zone. Therefore, irrigation should be continued on schedule
unless the rain is heavy (50 mm or more), which is very rare
in arid and semi-arid regions especially in hot desert
environments such as GCC countries. However, when such
heavy rains do occur, they are usually sufficient to leach
salts to deeper layers, leaving the root-zone salt free. In
summary, irrigating daily is usually sufficient to continuously
move the moisture down, into deeper soil zones, thereby
keeping the salt levels under control.

Sprinkler Irrigation:

With sprinkler irrigation, strong streams of

water are sprayed through the air to spread on the soil
surface. A good sprinkler irrigation (SI) must meet all of
the requirements of the crop for water, including
evapotranspiration (ET). Irrigation by sprinkler allows

efficient and economic use of water and reduces losses

through deep percolation of water through the soil. If water
applied via SI is in close agreement with crop needs (ET
plus leaching), excessive drainage and high watertable
problems can be greatly reduced, thus improving salinity
control. Sprinkler irrigation can be accomplished through
the use of fixed sprinklers or by a continually moving
system, such as center-pivot, linear moving laterals, and
other forms of travelling sprinklers. Special care should be
exercised in selecting nozzle size, operating pressure and
sprinkler spacing when using SI on fine textured soil
(which will have low intake rates) to ensure uniform water
application at low rates. While sprinkler irrigation will
uniformly distribute water, high wind can distort the
distribution of water applied, thus affecting water use
efficiency.
Windbreaks around the edges of the farm can help to reduce
the negative effects of strong wind. The saline water applied
with sprinkler can also cause leaf burn (necrosis) through
salt injury. Leaf necrosis from sprinkler irrigation can occur
when sodium exceeds 70 ppm, or chloride exceeds 105 ppm
in irrigation water. Thus, quality of water must closely match
the leaf burn tolerance of the crop plants. The leaves of
many plants readily absorb Na+, Ca2+, and Cl when water is
applied through sprinkler system. Finally, the high costs of

establishing and operating a sprinkler irrigation system limit

its adoption by smallholder subsistence farmers.
Assignment No:2

Topic: Potential Of Saline Agriculture For

Renewable Energy Resources In Pakistan.
Saline agriculture is a rich collection of possible systems
for the use of saline land, involving combinations of salt-
tolerant trees, shrubs and crops. The aim is to provide a
simple accessible account of saline agricultural practices
for irrigated land in Pakistan. Saline agriculture improves
food security with minimal impact on already scarce fresh
water supplies. Saline agriculture provides the possibility to;
Grow crops all year around.
Use saline water resources for irrigation.
Improve and reuse the degraded farm land (due to soil
salinity).

People have long believed that salt-affected land was

unusable. But as a result of in-depth research and
years of testing, a practical solution was found: Saline
agriculture.

It is very well possible to grow crops on salt-affected

land, as long as the right (salt tolerant) crops are being
used, combined with alternative techniques in irrigation,
fertilization and water management.

With saline agriculture, food is produced on salt-

affected soils and salt or brackish water is used for
irrigation.

Saline agriculture can make use of the world’s saline

resources.
If all of the world’s saline water would be used for
irrigation, it could double the amount of available water
for agriculture.

At the same time, saline agriculture limits the damage

caused by salinization by employing sustainable
practices for agriculture and water management, and
by making use of salt-tolerant crop varieties.

If salt-affected soils are put (back) into production, 70-

120 million hectares of new arable land can be saved,
along with their natural ecosystems and the associated
biodiversity.

The four pillars of (saline) agriculture

Because of the generally negative effects of salinity on

crop yields, salinization threatens food production and
food security in many areas in the world.

Saline agriculture is a possible solution: food is

produced on salt-affected soils and/or using salt or
brackish water for irrigation water.

The latter strategy also saves fresh water, which is a

scarce resource on this planet, and even more so in
those areas generally affected by salinization.

To make saline agriculture possible, conventional

farming techniques would need to be adapted. We
have identified four pillars of agriculture, all of which
would need to be adapted to make saline agriculture
possible:

Crop and cultivar choice

Irrigation
Fertilization
 Soil management
Available water resources in world:

Salts are a naturally occurring substance in both soil and

water. Increases in soil salinity, or salinization, can occur for
a number of reasons including flooding from seawater,
saltwater intrusion through the soil, recurring cycles of
irrigation and use of fertilizers. Unfortunately, this
phenomenon can have detrimental effects on farming as
many crops do not thrive in such saline conditions. And as
salinization is on the rise across the globe, the amount of
land suitable for agriculture continues to decrease. Farmers
are more and more unable to use their lands, which can lead
to food insecurity as well as economic challenges.
Traditional farming techniques use fresh water for irrigation,
but as fresh water is a limited resource, it is becoming even
more important to adapt and find alternatives. With saline
agriculture, food is produced in salt-affected soil and
brackish water is used for irrigation. There happens to be as
much brackish water in the world as there is fresh water.

So, if all of the world’s brackish water would be used for

irrigation it could effectively double the amount of available
water for agriculture, helping to reduce water stress in many
areas. And with millions of hectares of degraded soils
around the world, there is great potential for saline
agriculture. Its not about the crops but selecting the right,
salt-tolerant crops is a critical part of saline agriculture. But in
order to do that, you first need to understand the soil, water
and local climate conditions. Salt-affected soil, which is
found not only in coastal areas but also inland, measures
nearly one billion hectares globally. There are many minerals
that are classified as salts, so understanding which are
dominant in the soil and the water helps in determining the
best approach to saline farming.

But it’s also important to consider climate conditions, says Dr.

Arjen de Vos, founder of The Salt Doctors. “For instance, in
countries with monsoons, there is a lot of fresh water during
the rainy season, which leads to leaching of the salts to the
deeper layers of the soil. But in places like North Africa and
the Middle East that don’t have a monsoon, there’s not
enough precipitation to have rain-fed agriculture, so with no
leaching due to rains the whole approach to farming is
different.”
In addition to the technical details, de Vos says there are
socio-economic factors that influence the approach to crop
selection with saline farming. Things like farmer crop
preference, access to seeds, the market potential
(local/regional/export), and policy also need to be considered.
To achieve large scale impact, it is important to include the
policy makers, the whole value chain of agriculture, to be
sure that many stakeholders are involved. The potentiality of
using halophytes in saline agriculture has been explored in
the last decades. The use of halophytes in commercial
cultures/exploitation, though still limited, is already being
applied for some species. Halophytes can be improved into
new, salt-resistant crops, or used as a source of genes to be
introduced into conventional crop species that in general
have their economical production decreased as soil salt
levels increase. We’ll discuss here some of the potential of
halophytic species to use as emergent or already used crops
in arid and semi-arid regions, in a perspective of sustainable
development. The sustainable use of halophytes has
multiple purposes as stimulating productive ecosystems and
regreening degraded areas. About 2,600 halophytic
species are known and only few are extensively studied for
their potential in agriculture and as biological resources with
economical potential as sources of oils, flavours, gums,
resins, oils, pharmaceuticals, and fibbers, or with
environmental potential for protection and conservation of
ecosystems (e.g., improvement of soil structure and fertility,
habitat for wildlife, source of biomass for the production of
biodiesel. Salicornia bigelovii (Chenopodiaceae) is a very
well-studied species. As a typical halophyte it is a succulent
(having CAM metabolism) plant being cultivated for its
oilseed (both for human and animal use) and straw. There
residual seed meal is very rich in protein (approximately 33–
34% crude protein). This oilseed halophyte has a yield and
seed quality similar to the soybean, reaching yields of 2 t/ha
of seed containing 28% oil and 31% protein. In fact, field
trials with Salicornia bigelovii conducted in Puerto Penasco,
Mexico (a coastal desert environment), demonstrated a
production of 18 t/ha of biomass and 2 t/ha of seed over a
200-day growing cycle in which the seed contained 31%
protein and 28% oil rich in polyunsaturated fatty acids (being
the linoleic acid 74% of the total). The growth rates of
animals fed with Salicornia bigelovii are equivalent to those
fed with conventional forages on equal amounts such as
alfalfa and wheat straw Oilseeds. Seeds of various
halophytes, such as Suaedafruticosa, Arthrocnemum
macrostachyum, Salicornia bigelovii,S. brachiata,
Halogeton glomeratus, Kochia scoparia, and Haloxylon
stocksii possess a sufficient quantity of high quality edible
oil with unsaturation ranging from 70–80%. Seeds of
Salvadora oleoides and S. persica contain 40–50% fat and
are a good source of lauric acid a potential substitute for
coconut oil.
The increase in nutrient demand by the prosperous society
and the decreasing availability of arable land and freshwater
lead to the problem of agriculture sustainable development.
With these perspectives, saline agriculture is coming up as
an emerging role. In the future this agricultural area may be
of extreme importance in Mediterranean countries due to the
increasing soil degradation in some regions and to their
geographic and climatic conditions. Without a
comprehensive and long-term strategy adapt-able to the
prevailing economic, climatic, social, as well as edaphic and
hydrogeological conditions, it is not considered possible to
meet the future challenges of irrigated agriculture using
poor-quality water.