Optimal Control for Precision Irrigation of a Large‐Scale Plantation

Distributing water optimally is a complex problem that many farmers face yearly, especially in times of drought. In this work, we propose optimization‐based feedback control to improve crop yield and water productivity in agriculture irrigation for a plantation consisting of multiple fields. The interaction between soil, water, crop (sugarcane...

Water Accounting Plus for Water Resources Reporting and River Basin Planning

This thesis introduces Water Accounting Plus (WA+), which is a new framework designed to provide explicit spatial information on water depletion and net withdrawal processes in complex river basins. WA+ is a simple, yet comprehensive and understandable water accounting framework that provides a standardized way of data collection and a...

Water productivity in rainfed agriculture; redrawing the rainbow of water to achieve food security in rainfed smallholder systems

The challenge of water scarcity as a result of insufficient seasonal rainfall and dry spell occurrences during cropping seasons is compounded by inefficient agricultural practices by smallholder farmers where insignificant soil and water conservation efforts are applied. The hypothesis of this research is that many of the past research efforts...

Benchmarking water productivity in agriculture and the scope for improvement - remote sensing modelling from field to global scale

Agriculture is the largest consumer and water. In the context of an increasing population and less water available for the agricultural sector, the water productivity needs to be sustained or increased to secure food security. This study provides benchmark values for water productivity for the major crops globally. Data were obtained from a...

Conservation tillage systems and water productivity implications for smallholder farmers in semi-arid Ethiopia

Conservation tillage systems have been adopted by farmers in many countries to solve the problem of land degradation and declining water productivity. However, direct application of such tillage systems was not possible among resource poor smallholder farmers in semi arid areas of Ethiopia. Problems such as shortage of rainfall, cost of...