Design and Installation of Controlled Drip Irrigation System

Abstract

Globally, agriculture sector uses major share of available freshwater. Pakistan is an agricultural country and its major economy depends upon the agriculture sector. In Pakistan, freshwater sacristy rate is increasing due to poor sanitation and water management system, increase in population and food demands, and use of fresh water flood irrigation system to irrigate the agricultural land. This ultimately poses harmful effect on the economy of country. About 73% of freshwater resource is consumed for the irrigation purpose in Pakistan. The increase in population and the food demand is an impetus to adopt drip irrigation system at large in the country. In such a scenario, controlled drip irrigation system serves the suitable technique to limit the water supplied to the crops at regular interval for agriculture, and replaces the flood irrigation system. Besides ordinary drip irrigation system, the controlled drip irrigation system monitors and controls the soil moisture and temperature of the crops using sensors and actuators. This study is aimed at designing and installation of controlled drip irrigation system for crop fields at Nasarpur, Sindh, Pakistan. It was expected that agricultural sector will become more productive by effectively using the fresh water resources. The study has shown that converting conventional irrigation into controlled drip irrigation has saved freshwater to a greater extent and marginal excessive use energy used in pumping and the control system. On the other hand it has also minimized the energy usage for pumping fresh water through large tube wells.