Salinity Management for Sustainable Irrigation: Integrating Science, Environment, and Economics

Is irrigation sustainable, and if so, how and under what conditions? That is the question that has impelled the writing of this report. This report examine the nature of salinity, its effects on crop production, its effects on irrigation water, the effects of watrlogging and drainage, efforts to control salinity, the use of early warning systems, and social and institutional issues posed by salinity to conclude that irrigated agriculture will not only survive but indeed thrive in the proper circumstances and with appropriate measures. However, this statement is conditional: in some specific locations, inherently inefficient, self-destructive, and environmentally damaging operations will be forced to terminate. On the whole, however, irrigated agriculture should be able to adapt to the long-term requirements of sustainability, and to continue to feed humanity in the even more than in the past.

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