Limitations and Agronomic Approaches for Enhancing Wheat's Water Use Efficiency in the Azadegan Plain of Khuzestan Province

Azadegan Plain (AP) in Khuzestan province is located in the downstream of Karkheh River Basin (KRB). Wheat is the main crop cultivated in this plain and beacause of soil and water limitations¡ mainly salinity and waterlogging¡ its average yield is not beyond 1.5 tons per hectare. The objective of this research is to find out the limitations and sources of inefficiencies in enhancing water use efficiency (WUE) of Wheat crop in the AP. Hence¡ based on information and data obtained from the the two years experiments¡ some extention approaches and measures were proposed for the improvement of Wheat’ WUE in the plain. Analysis of measured WUEs indicated that the range of variation in WUE values is relatively high and varies between 0.1-2.1 Kg.m-3. Evaluation of results indicated that sources of inefficiencies and the limiting factors affecting WUE in the AP are combined effects of soil salinity¡ waterlogging¡ poor irrigation management¡ and other crop and field management practices. For obtaining higher WUEs in the plain¡ the following actions should be practiced: 1) The common traditional irrigation method to be changed the basin irrigation method¡ 2) The proper plots to be conducted based on the field slope¡ 3) Construction of fixed and simple water barriers for water intake to the field channels¡ 4) Ttraining of the farmers and required technical support to them.