Drip Irrigation
Drip irrigation is a type of micro-irrigation system that has the potential to save water and nutrients by allowing water to drip slowly to the roots of plants, either from above the ground surface or buried below the surface.
The purpose is to place water directly into the root zone to minimize evaporation. Micro-irrigation should implement on a large basis as we know environmental conditions and water scarcity in India.
To achieve sustainability in Indian agriculture, the importance of micro-irrigation is quite evident and significant. But it’s a long way ahead and requires extensive demonstrations, training, and awareness programs. So that it will bring the Indian farming community abreast with micro-irrigation practices.
Environmental Benefits Of Drip Irrigation
Drip irrigation is a type of irrigation that utilizes a pressurized or non-pressurized system of pipes that delivers a set amount of water to the base of the crop which is directly used by the plant’s roots.
Some major benefits of Irrigation systems:
- Water Conservation– Drip irrigation has the highest irrigation efficiency of all the irrigation methods.
- Low to Nil Soil Erosion– Because water delivered using pipes.
- Reduced risk of water contamination– Flooding and other irrigation techniques can cause algal bloom if fertilizers escape from the field to nearby watersheds.
Why Irrigation Is Not Gaining Popularity In India?
A study shows many farmers prefer unsubsidized, cheaper drip irrigation systems even if they can avail the subsidy for high-quality ones. In that study, Maharashtra’s Twenty farmers who use drip irrigation were interviewed with some local bureaucrats, retailers, and manufacturers.
It concluded growing vegetables such as tomatoes or onions can cost farmers ₹80,000–85,000 per hectare with an unsubsidized high-quality drip irrigation system. But this cost goes down to ₹24,000–30,000 with a low-quality system.
Before 2012 farmers has paid only the part of the purchase of irrigation set because of subsidies from the government and the rest amount given to the manufacturing companies from the government.
But these payments often got delayed due to various reasons, hence manufacturing companies raised the prices of irrigation sets. To overcome this situation government came up with a solution as, farmers now had to bear the full cost of the set, with subsidy payments paid later on into their bank account.
Challenges For Adopting Micro Irrigation:
- Inadequate water availability at farm level.
- Non-availability of uninterrupted electric power.
- Inadequate focus on nationwide micro-irrigation technology.
- It has a high cost of installation and maintenance, plus complicated procedures to redeem subsidies provided by the government for installation of Micro Irrigation.
Future Of Drip Irrigation
The farmers who have used Micro-Irrigation are happy with it. So far they have been immensely benefitted by the way of increased quality, productivity, and higher income generation. This is achieved by a 50-90% increase in water efficiency, 30% energy savings, nearly 28% fertilizer consumption savings, and new crop introductions
The Future of Drip Irrigation is very bright. Since water resources are depleting day by day, the government is also trying to adopt minor Irrigation throughout the country.
There are dozens of schemes and subsidies for Drip Irrigation.
For irrigation dealers, Dripwala App can help you to get more and more customers. As it gives fast results farmers also don’t have to wait for Irrigation designs and quotations. Dripwala gives a higher customer retention rate with customer satisfaction.