Skip to content
Hindi News, हिंदी समाचार, Samachar, Breaking News, Latest Khabar – Pratirodh

Hindi News, हिंदी समाचार, Samachar, Breaking News, Latest Khabar – Pratirodh

Primary Menu Hindi News, हिंदी समाचार, Samachar, Breaking News, Latest Khabar – Pratirodh

Hindi News, हिंदी समाचार, Samachar, Breaking News, Latest Khabar – Pratirodh

  • Home
  • Newswires
  • Politics & Society
  • The New Feudals
  • World View
  • Arts And Aesthetics
  • For The Record
  • About Us
  • Featured

Drip Irrigation System For Rice To Solve Global Problem

Dec 15, 2020 | Pratirodh Bureau

A man kneels beside an irrigation system at a research center for developing more efficient methods to water crops, in Kibbutz Magal, Israel on November 30, 2020

An Israeli company has developed a drip irrigation system for growing rice to replace the flooded paddies that have supplied the world with rice for generations but cause a surprising level of damage to the environment.

Rice is the staple food for more than half the global population, but its cultivation uses 30-40% of the world’s freshwater and is responsible for 10% of man-made emissions of greenhouse gas methane, according to the U.N.-backed Sustainable Rice Platform.

Netafim, a company that pioneered drip irrigation decades ago to grow produce like potatoes and melons across Israel’s challenging arid landscape, has just finished a pilot scheme using its technology on 1,000 hectares (2,470 acres) of rice fields in locations from Europe to southern Asia.

At one such location, at La Fagiana farm in northeast Italy, two fields, side-by-side, grow a high quality rice for risotto. One is flooded, covered entirely by up to 15 cm of water to maintain temperatures and keep away weeds.

The other is criss-crossed with perforated pipes delivering to the roots precise amounts of water, amounting to less than half the quantity used on the flooded field.

“We want to increase the production without increasing water use or lowering quality,” said Michele Conte, whose family has managed La Fagiana for decades and who has adopted the Netafim system on some of his land.

For three years, the drip irrigation has yielded rice on par and at times even better quality than the flooded paddies, he said. It also allows them to rotate crops throughout the year.

Netafim said it had to learn from scratch how to achieve the same yield as flooding and it took a decade to create a new protocol for watering, fertilizing and planting rice with drip irrigation.

The growing conditions switch to aerobic from anaerobic, which means methane emission “goes to zero,” said CEO Gaby Miodownik.

Conte said the schedule for treating the rice still needs some fine tuning but that it has become a selling point for environmentally-concerned customers.

The initial investment in pipes, pumps and filters could be expensive for farmers whose profit margins are, for the most part, already thin.

But the shift away from flooding is expected to gain traction and companies like India’s Jan Irrigation are developing drip irrigation packages for rice as well.

Demand for rice is expected to rise 25% by 2050 and rice paddies leave too big a footprint, said Wyn Ellis, executive director at the Sustainable Rice Platform.

Drip irrigation was producing impressive results, doubling water productivity, and “getting more grain for every drop”.

Experts agree rice cultivation needs to become more sustainable.

“The sector needs a transformation,” Ellis said.

Tags: drip irrigation, environment, Pratirodh, rice cultivation, Sustainable Rice Platform

Continue Reading

Previous Opposition Parties Are Misleading Farmers: PM Modi
Next Ratings Manipulation Case: Republic TV CEO Sent To Jail

More Stories

  • Featured

Black Days Ahead If Coal City Doesn’t Change

1 day ago Pratirodh Bureau
  • Featured

US Firm Alleges ‘Brazen’ Fraud By Adani, Who Calls It Malicious

2 days ago Pratirodh Bureau
  • Featured

Why Ukraine War Today Is So Different From A Year Ago

2 days ago Pratirodh Bureau

Recent Posts

  • Black Days Ahead If Coal City Doesn’t Change
  • US Firm Alleges ‘Brazen’ Fraud By Adani, Who Calls It Malicious
  • Why Ukraine War Today Is So Different From A Year Ago
  • No Screening Of BBC Docu At JNU As Power, Internet Cut
  • Shielding The Hijol From Climate Impacts
  • Bilkis Bano’s Plea Against Convicts’ Remission Could Not Be Heard In SC
  • NDRF To Station Permanent Teams In Hills For Rescue Operations
  • Thousands Of Indian IT Professionals Jobless In The US
  • How Solar-Powered Refrigerators Slow Down Climate Change
  • Compensation For Crop Loss: Landless, Tenant Farmers Miss Out
  • Peru Closes Machu Picchu As Anti-Government Protests Grow
  • There Was No Need To Scrap Article 370: Dulat
  • RSS Ideology And Netaji’s Ideals Poles Apart: Anita Bose-Pfaff
  • UN Sorry For Photo Of Its Personnel In Front Of Taliban Flag
  • Govt Has Reduced Parliament To Notice Board, Rubber Stamp: Tharoor
  • Decline In China’s Population Will Have Global Implications
  • Documentary On Modi ‘Rigorously Researched’, Says BBC
  • Delhi To Women: Enter At Your Own Risk
  • Opinion: India’s Climate Plan Can’t Work Sans Protecting Forests
  • Elon Musk’s Twitter Is Ripe For An Avalanche Of Misinformation

Search

Main Links

  • Home
  • Newswires
  • Politics & Society
  • The New Feudals
  • World View
  • Arts And Aesthetics
  • For The Record
  • About Us

Related Stroy

  • Featured

Black Days Ahead If Coal City Doesn’t Change

1 day ago Pratirodh Bureau
  • Featured

US Firm Alleges ‘Brazen’ Fraud By Adani, Who Calls It Malicious

2 days ago Pratirodh Bureau
  • Featured

Why Ukraine War Today Is So Different From A Year Ago

2 days ago Pratirodh Bureau
  • Featured

No Screening Of BBC Docu At JNU As Power, Internet Cut

2 days ago Pratirodh Bureau
  • Featured

Shielding The Hijol From Climate Impacts

2 days ago Shalini

Recent Posts

  • Black Days Ahead If Coal City Doesn’t Change
  • US Firm Alleges ‘Brazen’ Fraud By Adani, Who Calls It Malicious
  • Why Ukraine War Today Is So Different From A Year Ago
  • No Screening Of BBC Docu At JNU As Power, Internet Cut
  • Shielding The Hijol From Climate Impacts
Copyright © All rights reserved. | CoverNews by AF themes.