The utilization of treated agro-industrial effluents has been recommended as sound option for agriculture irrigations practices and sustainable land management programme. This paper presents the impact of utilizing treated effluent form a distillery industry on physico-chemical properties of soils in an agriculture plot. The effluent was applied in 50 and 100% strength and a control plot receiv...

One of the main factors limiting the yield and productivity of irrigated rice in the Sahel of West Africa is the high cost of fertilizers and inefficient use of nutrients in the cropping systems. A two-year experiment was conducted over four consecutive seasons at Ndiaye (16°11’N, 16°15’W) and Fanaye (16°32’N, 15°11’W) along the Senegal River Valley to investigate alternative fertilizer managem...

Improved cropping systems are needed to reduce production inputs, increase production efficiency, protect water quality, and reduce soil erosion on furrow-irrigated land. Five field studies were conducted to evaluate the feasibility of producing cereal or corn (Zea Mays L.) without tillage following alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.) on furrow-irrigated land. The primary purposes of these studies wer...

The impact of management on global warming potential (GWP), crop production, and greenhouse gas intensity (GHGI) in irrigated agriculture is not well documented. A no-till (NT) cropping systems study initiated in 1999 to evaluate soil organic carbon (SOC) sequestration potential in irrigated agriculture was used in this study to make trace gas flux measurements for 3 yr to facilitate a complete...

Global food security requires eco-efficient agriculture to produce the required food and fiber products concomitant with ecologically efficient use of resources. This eco-efficiency concept is used to diagnose the state of agricultural production in China (irrigated wheat-maize double-cropping systems), Zimbabwe (rainfed maize systems), and Australia (rainfed wheat systems). More than 3,000 sur...

Sustainable water use is seriously compromised in the North China Plain (NCP) due to the huge water requirements of agriculture, the largest use of water resources. An integrated approach which combines the ecosystem model with emergy analysis is presented to determine the optimum quantity of irrigation for sustainable development in irrigated cropping systems. Since the traditional emergy meth...

Cropping systems and management practices that improve soil health may greatly enhance crop productivity. Four different potato cropping designed to address specific goals of conservation (SC), improvement (SI), disease suppression (DS), a status quo (SQ) standard rotation, along with non-rotation (PP) control, were evaluated for their effects on growth, nutrient, yield characteristics under bo...

Published in Agron. J. 103:76–84 (2011) Published online 3 Nov 2010 doi:10.2134/agronj2010.0189 Copyright © 2011 by the American Society of Agronomy, 5585 Guilford Road, Madison, WI 53711. All rights reserved. No part of this periodical may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrie...

Nitrate-nitrogen leached from the root zone of land in intensive corn production is a major groundwater contaminant in some of the intensively irrigated regions of the western Cornbelt, including central and western Nebraska. To obtain a clearer understanding of the amount and timing of nitrate leaching losses from irrigated crops, 14 monolithic percolation lysimeters were installed in 1989-199...