Water Use Assessment of Date in Sistan and Balouchestan Province Based on the Concept of Virtual Water

Date is one of the most important horticultural products in Iran, which plays an important role in added value of the agriculture, economy and food security. Water resources restriction is one of the main challenges of date product in different areas. Thus, consumption management and optimal use of water resources for production is essential. A practical approach to water resources management is estimation of crop water requirements and determination of water volume consumed in the process of crop production. Virtual water is a measure to estimate actual water use by different crops. Therefore in this research, date water requirement was firstly estimated by CROPWAT in Sistan and Baluchestan Province. Afterward, the volume of virtual water, water footprint, blue and Green water were calculated for growing seasons of 2011-2017. The results showed that the average date water requirement is 21976.52 m3 ha-1 in this province. However, the amount of applied water was measured to be 46659.58 m3 ha-1. This indicates a low water productivity for date production in this province, as the water productivity of date was calculated to be 0.29 kg/m3. The average application of water for date production was estimated to be 399.67 million Cubic meters. Iranshahr, Saravan, Sarbaz and Nikshahr had the highest exploitation of water resources. The average virtual water for date production was found to be 3.82 m3 kg-1. The results of estimated footprint showed that this province has a low potential for using rainwater to irrigate date palm.