Managing Water Resources in the West Under Conditions of Climate Uncertainty A Proceedings (1991) / Chapter Skim
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16. Improvements in Agricultural Water Management
16. Improvements in Agricultural Water Management
Pages 284-289
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From page 284... ...
Now, with the prospect of larger variations in temperature and precipitation brought about by climate change, farmers are faced with even greater uncertainties about water supplies for crops, forage, and livestock. In the next 30 to 50 years, we could witness large-scale changes in agriculture resulting from the continued depletion of our natural resources land and energy as well as water-and our heightened awareness that some agricultural practices are driving environmental change.
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From page 285... ...
THE NEED FOR NEW KNOWLEDGE We need to improve our quantitative understanding of basic hydrologic processes: ground water recharge, snow accumulation, rainfall variations with elevation, evaporation, and how all of these processes influence streamflow. We also need to develop improved fundamental process models that link appropriate hydrologic processes to relative factors in environmental change.
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From page 286... ...
Existing meteorological information could be used more often to provide statistical probabilities that certain events will occur for example, to provide the probable beginning and duration of rainy seasons or the statistical likelihood that a drought will continue for a specific period. Such knowledge is useful in planning the introduction of drought-resistant cultivars, selecting the crop to be produced, introducing new crop rotation systems, and selecting improved agricultural practices.
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From page 287... ...
Irrigated Agriculture Irrigated agriculture consumes 80 percent of our fresh water supply. Although it accounts for only 11 percent of our total crop land (16 percent of total harvested crop land)
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From page 288... ...
Weather modification, water harvesting, snow harvesting, livestock management, water spreading, and other techniques are available for improving water-use efficiency of range and crop plants. However, environmental impacts of altering meteorological parameters such as precipitation have not been determined scientifically, and intensive, well-designed experimentation is still needed to evaluate properly the potential usefulness of weather modification techniques.
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From page 289... ...
Even without environmental changes, agriculture will be faced with the seemingly impossible challenge of providing for twice as many people-each person with increasing demands-as exist now. With a relatively fixed land base and water supply and with diminishing reserves of petroleum and mineral resources, our options for increasing agricultural production are severely limited.
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