Site Selection for Installing the Pressurized Irrigation Systems in the Kerman Plain Using the Geographic Information System

The 7500 km2 Kerman Plain is badly suffering from water shortage due to overexploitationof its groundwater resources. Therefore, replacing the traditional irrigationmethods with the pressurized systems is in order to highly increase water use efficiency. This necessitates finding the most suitable sites for installing sprinkler and drip irrigation systems.The GIS technology along with the Boulian model facilitated locating the farm fields intended for this purpose. Of the surveyed terrains, 5 percent were judged suitable for sprinkler irrigation, and 25 percent were found to be suitable for drip irrigation.