Enhancing water productivity through conjunctive use of surface and groundwater resources in upland plateau regions of Odisha

Abstract

Non-availability of water during post-monsoon and summer seasons is a major impediment to crop production in upland areas. Keeping this in view, a study was conducted to evaluate the impact of integrated water resource development and management strategies on agricultural production in a plateau area of Sundargarh district, Odisha. For development of water resources, flow regulating devices like inlet, outlet and surplus escape were designed and created in one of the canal linked service reservoir located in Ghurlijore Minor irrigation project (MIP) of the study area, based on the drainage coefficient of 136 mm d-1. A dug well of 6.0 m outer diameter and 9.0 m depth was also created along the drainage line adjacent to the canal linked service reservoir. Based on the available water resource, an area of 1.1 ha was selected for growing different crops (kharif rice, mustard in rabi and groundnut and green gram in summer) under the study. The pipe conveyance system coupled with sprinkler irrigation was laid out for irrigating the crops in the area. The flow regulating pattern in the outlet device and surplus escape were observed in sub-critical flow range. The hydraulic evaluation of dug well indicated that drawdown of the well was 36 cm hr-1 when a 5 hp pump was used in pumping with recuperation rate of 3.0 cm hr-1. With using 6300 m3 water from the well as supplemental irrigation (4 numbers) during dry spells, the yield of rice could be increase by 32% compared with non-irrigated rice in monsoon season. Among different irrigation methods (check basin, furrow and sprinkler), sprinkler irrigation saved 30-33% irrigation water with producing 24-27% higher yield, resulting in 84% improvement in water productivity compared with check basin irrigation in groundnut and green gram. The net economic water productivity could be achieved as ` 1.14 m-3, ` 5.93 m-3, ` 8.03 m-3 and ` 5.38 m-3 for paddy, rapeseed, groundnut and green gram crops, respectively under irrigation. Further, pisciculture taken up in the service reservoir showed that after 210 days of rearing of fish fingerlings, the average mean body weight (MBW) obtained as 17.5 g, 11.5 g and 12 g for catla, rohu and mrigal, respectively with total harvested biomass of 2.57 t ha-1. Overall, the development and management of surface and groundwater resources and its efficient management helped in bringing diversification in crop production integrating with pisciculture which resulted higher profit in farming in an upland plateau area of the study region.