Impacts of Pressurized Irrigation Technologies on Efficient Water Resources Uses in Semi-Arid Climate of Konya Basin of Turkey

Performance evaluation of irrigation has been an important area of research for better management of water resources. The present study was carried out to evaluate the performance of pressurized irrigation systems by using the previous researches conducted by our team in the Konya Basin of Turkey. The uniformity coefficient, UC and distribution uniformity, DU, as a performance parameter were analyzed. The average UC and DU values for drip irrigated areas were 80.9% and 68.9%, respectively. These values for sprinkler irrigated lands were 86.8% and 79.9%, respectively. The overall result showed that both UC and DU values were lower in drip irrigation than sprinkler irrigation. In general, sprinkler irrigation system has been applied for a long time while drip irrigation system has been used only recent years in Konya Closed Basin so low uniformity in drip irrigation system might be attributed to the poor experience of farmers especially about management and maintenance. It can be concluded that pressurized irrigation systems are efficient irrigation methods and should be widely used in agriculture especially in arid and semi-arid regions of the world under good management for sustainable water resources use.