The Financial Benefits Of Irrigation Systems

Irrigation is used for many things including feeding crops and livestock, and bringing fresh water to communities where water is scarce. 

In advanced farming economies, irrigation is a costly, but required initial investment.  Thus, careful planning and execution are needed to make sure that fields become more productive relative to the cost of installing irrigation systems.  Agriculture irrigation design software provides the solutions needed for farmers and engineers to construct an irrigation system that will fit their fields.

History Of Irrigation

Archeological investigations into Mesopotamia and Egypt have found evidence of irrigation as early as the 6th millennium BC or more than 8,000 years ago.  Irrigation was applied in geographical areas where rainfall was not enough for water to support the crop.  The young agricultural towns from the Neolithic period saw much development in the technology of agriculture irrigation.  By the 4th millennium BC, the Andes Mountains where modern day Peru is located were filled with canals.  This is the earliest recorded agriculture irrigation in the new world.

With the development of agriculture, irrigation became more sophisticated in the Indus Valley, found in modern day Pakistan and Northern India.  Perhaps the most documented trace of irrigation is from the Egyptian civilization, where the Nile River floods annually to enrich the soil and serve as a natural irrigation.  However, as the population in Egyptian cities grew, they found a way to control the flooding while using irrigation to store the water for the dry season.

Like all agricultural societies in ancient times, it is interesting to know how the technology of irrigation started from different civilizations without the benefit of trade.  Ancient irrigation systems were found in Sri Lanka, China, and Korea.

Development of irrigation from Asian tradition did not change much from the 15th century until the advent of diesel and electric motors in the middle of the 20th century.  During the 50's, diesel motors were devised to extract water from aquifers and spread it to the fields.  Since then, agriculture irrigation has been so complex that it takes the skill of architects and engineers to construct a viable irrigation system.

Throughout the history of agriculture, irrigation proved to be the lifeline of civilization and growing cities.  Today, 689 million acres of agricultural land are equipped with irrigation across the world.  Sixty-eight percent of all irrigated lands is found in Asia; seventeen percent is found in North America, and 9 percent in Europe.

Importance Of Irrigation

Irrigation is credited as one of the reasons why societies become sustainable and grow into great civilizations.  In societies where agriculture is important, irrigation helps maintain a growing population.  It ensures that crops are fed with water throughout the year, so these fields will not be dependent on weather and rain patterns.  Irrigation also allows farmers to plant crops in regions where it is unnatural for them to grow.  With irrigation, there is more certainty in the level of output from a given crop field, making the market for raw food materials more stable.  On the micro level, irrigated fields prevent massive loss of crops because of bad weather and insure families of their incomes.

Irrigation is more important for farmers in developing countries than in developed countries.  There are massive government programs in Asia that build irrigation systems as public infrastructure.  Canals and other man-made irrigation systems are constructed for rice paddies to ensure not only the incomes of small farming families, but also to make sure that the economy has enough food output to sustain the population of the whole country. 

The United States and other developed countries also have government programs to develop irrigation in arid regions, but with most lands for agriculture, irrigation is done by the private sector.  Since irrigation is an affordable technology these days, the real issue in developed countries is making irrigation systems more efficient so they won’t waste two of the most important resources that countries need - water and energy.  This is where advanced designs aided by agriculture irrigation design software steps in.

Necessity Of Agriculture Irrigation Design

The main reason why irrigation should be expertly designed by farmers and engineers is to make sure it will not take a wasteful amount of water and energy to produce the optimum amount of crops.  The function and use of irrigation is different depending on the weather and climate conditions.  For example, arid areas where there is little or no rainfall will always need a working irrigation system that works at regular intervals.  On the other hand, crop fields in humid areas where rainfall is expected should have planned irrigation systems to work well with prevailing rainfall conditions.  Applying irrigation in areas with enough rainfall amounts to over-irrigation, which is a waste in resources and an inefficient way to allocate capital.

There are different types of irrigation techniques that people can use to make sure that water is distributed to the field.  The basic types of irrigation are surface irrigation and localized irrigation.  Surface irrigation, or flood irrigation, is the most common method in irrigating agricultural lands.  It uses gravity to direct water from the source to the fields.  Localized irrigation is a system where water is distributed under low pressure through a piped network and applied to the field though drips and sprinklers.

In the field and economy of agriculture, irrigation system design software is important to optimize production in large fields where complex agricultural systems are needed.  Irrigation design is especially vital in sprinkler irrigation, center pivot irrigation, and lateral move irrigation.  Outlaying and investing in advanced irrigation systems can be costly in the short run, but if the system is well planned and built efficiently, farmers can reap returns on investments through increased and sustained crop production.

The use of irrigation design principles such as irrigation scheduling will allow farmers to manage their water and energy cost while minimizing yield loss because of water shortage.