International Commission on Irrigation & Drainage Commission Interationale des Irrigation et du Drainage



Irrigation and Climate Resilience

Many natural systems are now being affected by climate change. In order to lower the adverse impacts, the international community has adopted multiple measures to deal with climate change. Adaptation measures may soften the adverse impact of climate change, but with the intensifying climate change, adaptation measures alone can hardly remove all these impacts. Mitigation measures can reduce long-term adaptation cost to a certain extent. Therefore, to deal with climate change, it is necessary to adopt mitigation and adaption measures at the same time.

Climate change has increased the possibility and intensity of drought. So the appropriate water management would be able to increase the resilience of agricultural production to climate change.Due to the constraint of water resources, the supply of agricultural irrigation water cannot be expanded blindly.

 

Studies have shown that enhanced water use efficiency holds the key to tackling water scarcity and food security issues. Water saving irrigation (WSI) can mitigate the negative impact of climate change on water resources available to agriculture and overcome the constraint of water scarcity by reducing water consumption and increasing water productivity.

 

Studies have shown that WSI can reduce water consumption and increase grain production. Agricultural water-saving is necessary prerequisites for comprehensively redressing the worsening water shortage problems. Sprinkler irrigation is a major contributor to the significantly increased yield and water use efficiency of winter wheat than border irrigation. Large-scale water-saving crop production systems need to be established in the near future in order to feed growing population.

 

In order to mitigate climate warming, it is necessary to minimize greenhouse gas emissions resulting from adaptation.

 

WSI measures help in coping with climate change, with a view to provide technical support to appropriate actions to address climate change, reduce its adverse impact on agricultural production, and ensure food security.WSI can reduce soil salinization and conserve soil to sustain land productivity and environmental benefits. So WSI can be a positive measure in coping with climate change when it is rightly deployed.

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