That also have an impact on the water levels in our dams that are currently (10 January 2018) standing at
59.9% on average. See Figure 4.
Despite the significant achievements in irrigated agriculture, efficient water use for irrigation need
to improve. Irrigation professionals have an important role to develop advanced methods and smart
Figure 4: Provincial summary of the state of dams in South Africa on 10 January 2018
irrigation systems to significantly reduce the water
consumption and increases the water efficiency.
In recent years, the cost of technology has
dropped to make it both affordable and practical
in farm management. The crop sensing and
modelling systems can remotely collect data such
as humidity, barometric pressure, temperature,
luminosity, wind speed, precipitation and soil
moisture. These data, in turn, is used to predict
the right time and the amount of irrigation.
This goes on both proving the impact of, as well as
the future value in, the improvements in irrigation
on poverty alleviation and on the fight with hunger
and in ensuring adequate water allocation for
agriculture while sustaining the natural resource
base.
Irrigation has come a long way, from its foundation
to the present situation where the norm is
equitable and rightful water distribution to all. This
should continue, and all improvements in irrigation
Figure 5. Percentage of cropland area equipped for irrigation in SADC countries (1990-2009). (FAO
2016)
AgriKultuur |AgriCulture
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