AN ANALYSIS OF WATER DEMAND USED IN IRRIGATION USING CROPWAT 8.0 PROGRAM. CASE STUDY: PERIAM LOCALITY, TIMIS COUNTY

References: 13th SGEM GeoConference on Water Resources. Forest, Marine And Ocean Ecosystems, www.sgem.org, SGEM2013 Conference Proceedings, ISBN 978-619-7105-02-5 / ISSN 1314-2704, June 16-22, 2013, 11 - 18 pp

ABSTRACT

During the last century the human influence on environment had materialized through pollution provoking in this way climatic change at global level, changes which affect us more or less. An important problem of our days, generated by these climatic changes, is represented by water scarcity which manifests itself through dry periods, drought, aridity and sometimes leading even to complete land degradation.
As the study area of the climate was chosen Periam locality, north-western part of Timis County, due to its fertile soils and where the effects of water scarcity phenomenon need to be prevented or struggled. In order to achive a study on drought, the authors had processed climate data from Periam area (the nearest station being Sannicolau Mare weather station).
Periam locality being located in rural area, the main branch of economy is agriculture. Agriculture, as we know, depends very much on the climate conditions such as temperature, precipitation, relative humidity, soil moisture, etc.
This paper presents an analysis of water demand for agricultural areas from Periam locality using one program developed by FAO: CropWat 8.0. CROPWAT 8.0, allow the users to calculate crop water requirements and irrigation requirements based on soil, climate and crop data. We can also use this program to develop irrigation schedules for different management conditions. This program can also be used for the calculation of scheme water supply for varying crop patterns and to evaluate farmers’ irrigation practices and to estimate crop performance under both rainfed and irrigated conditions.

Keywords: irrigation, water resources, Cropwat 8.0, Timis County