Konceptogenagro

  Groundwater Depletion Due To Over-Irrigation The modern consumer is nowadays more conscious of buying sustainable or organic agricultural products because of health and environmental reasons. However these efforts, while laudable, are only worth it if the product being consumed is grown in the right manner. This means that agriculturists have to take care, especially in areas with inconsistent water supply and mixed soil like India, that their irrigation methods are sustainable, but without depleting groundwater in any way.    This is not an idle fear. The Central Ground Water Board (CGWB) in the  Fifth Minor Irrigation Census [1]   has posited that more than 1000 blocks in India have become water stressed since the Green revolution caused Indian farmers to depend more on groundwater rather than rainwater for their needs. According to this alarming report,  the groundwater level in India has declined by 61 per cent between 2007 and 2017 and of the extracted water 89 per cent is used

Automation is not a choice any more. It is now essential for survival. And it is true for all sectors of economy, including agriculture. The industrial revolution started with the textile industry in England. The revolution saw a large-scale use of machines and automation in clothes manufacturing. And that slowly but surely spread out in all other sectors. And today, all industries use automation to a very large extent because that is the only way to reduce production cost per unit and maximize profit.   Learning the nature’s laws and using the knowledge to produce food for a large population were what set humans apart from the other animals. And humans have been honing that skill since the last ten thousand years or more. With a population of 7.5 billion, the demand from the skill is huge and it is only going to get worse in the coming days. With a projected population of 10 billion by 2050 and the scarcity of fresh water looming large, agriculture is going to see far greater chal

                                                        Air Humidity A   micro climate  is set of atmospheric conditions of a specific area that may vary widely from the surrounding geographical area, especially Air Humidity and Air Temperature.            Humidity levels fluctuate with change with weather, air temperature as well as the plants constantly transpiring which add water vapor to the air. Humid directly contributes to problems such as foliar and root diseases, slow drying of growing medium, plant stress and loss of quality of yields.  Together with the air temperature, it also impacts heavily the affect of various pests of a particular crop. Therefore, more pesticides are needed for disease control and plants tend to have weak, stretched growth making the plant less desirable. Plants adjust their leaf stomatal openings on the VPD ( Vapour - pressure-deficit ) and the humidity in air. At high humidity, water usage by plant is too low which compromises quality of the yield.

  A farmer must know the following parameters of his/her field and constantly monitor pre, on-run & post irrigation : 1. Field Capacity, 2. Water Holding Capacity,  3. Wilting Point,  4. Saturation Point   5. Maximum Allowable Depletion. The scope of discussion will be restricted in this write up will be two of the most important parameters i.e., Field Capacity & Water Holding Capacity .                                                             Field Capacity  Field capacity is the amount of water remaining in the soil a few days after having been wetted and after free drainage has been ceased.  Soils hold different amounts of water depending on their texture and structure. The upper limit of water storage is often called "field capacity" (FC). It is the amount of water that remains in the soil after all the excess water at saturation has been drained out. Sandy soils allowed to drain for approximately 24 hours after saturation and the heavier textured soils tha