May 4th, 2009
You are full of water, so's your food
Because humans, corn, grapes, beer, ice cream, coffee and French fries all contain large amouns of water, most of us can agree it is a necessity. There are hints that life cannot exist without fresh, relatively non-toxic water. With that in mind researchers are looking for ways to use less water in agriculture without losing crop yields. Their technical name for this: crop water productivity.The methods used include some high tech monitoring and flow control, use of specific crop varieties that need less water, and some intense monitoring of crops to see what amoung of water is required to get maximum crops. Far from the old Water-it-until-the ground-looks-wet approach.
Researchers are also going to do further work on weighting evaporation loss compared to transpiration, which is the inevitable release of moisture by plants themselves. This research is leading into areas of farm management that have been largely done by supposition or superstition in times past.
A newsman since 1969, Harry Fuller has worked for CBS, ABC, CNBC Europe, CNET and was founding news director at TechTV. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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