World Water Day - 22 March 2007

Europe

In the face of growing demand for food and more irregularities of weather patterns and climate change, irrigation agriculture has expanded significantly over the last decades. Wasting water in inefficient irrigation schemes can contribute massively to scarcity, but also hurt long-term viability of the agriculture itself, both from an ecological and economic perspective.

The DEMETER research project in Europe was designed to assess and demonstrate in an operational perspective, how the integration of Earth Observation (EO) techniques in routine Irrigation Advisory Services (IAS) can improve the efficiency in the use of water for irrigation. The use of leading-edge Information and Communication Technology (ICT) tools in the generation and distribution of information makes the EO easily available to IAS and directly to the farmers.

The project ‘DEMonstration of Earth observation TEchnologies in Routine irrigation advisory services (DEMETER)’ (Environment, Energy and Sustainable Development Research Programme: EVG1-2002-CT-00078, duration from Dec. 2002 to Nov. 2005) mobilised 14 partners from five European countries and was coordinated by Anna Osann Jochum of Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha (UCLM, Spain).

The principal product of the collaboration was a prototype e-SARAS Ò (e-Servicio de Asesoramiento de Riego Asistido por Satélite) or e-SAIAS Ò (online Space-Assisted Irrigation Advisory Service). The key feature of the service is constituted by the operational generation of irrigation scheduling information products from a virtual constellation of high-resolution EO satellites and their delivery to farmers in near-real-time using leading-edge on-line analysis and visualisation tools. The service also supports a methodology package to derive crop coefficients and further advanced parameters from EO satellite images in an operational processing chain. This is provided together with a software package for spatial data handling, visualisation, and on-line analysis. Jointly, these two packages provide a tool for upgrading conventional irrigation advisory services or for implementing similar new services.

The research has been widely disseminated through conferences, the media and a good harvest of scientific publications. It has already led to practical applications.

The incorporation of leading-edge information technology gives rise to a qualitative and quantitative jump in the information supply to the farmer. It allows for transmitting not only the traditional irrigation scheduling information in improved and personalised form, but also a wide range of additional information that is of relevance to the farmer. The easy-to-use information products, transmitted to the farmer, are easily accessible and stimulate their use by the farmers. Farmers can opt to receive a wide variety of products, tailored to their needs and infrastructure, ranging from simple irrigation scheduling recommendation (irrigation volume, time) to colour-coded images (providing quick intuitive information on the crop vigour within their plots), both on PC and/or mobile phones.

In the longer term, DEMETER is seen as a timely contribution to the inter-related issues of raising water productivity ("more crops per drop"), enhancing rural development ("more jobs per drops"), and guaranteeing a sustainable agriculture. The space-assisted IAS developed in DEMETER is expected to provide tools and instruments relevant for the Water Framework Directive, the Common Agricultural Policy, and the Rural Development policies. At the local level, farmers have shown high interest in using and further evaluating these tools in the next irrigation season and in maintaining the system beyond the project duration. The e-SARAS Ò has been implemented at the Irrigation Advisory Service partner Instituto Técnico Agronómico Provincial (ITAP, Spain) as an operational tool from the 2006 irrigation season on.

Read more information on the project (summary) ( 87 KB), more details on its results and partners on the project website.

The work of the DEMETER partnership also links to possible new ways of societies to relate to one of their most precious resources, water. The Foundation ‘Nueva Cultura del Agua’ (New Water Culture, developed in Spain and Portugal) not only promotes respectful use of water across Europe, including linking between traditional and more recent practice, but also builds bridges geographically to Latin America. For more information see the website including references to examples of good practice.

A successor project to DEMETER is developing and adapting the basic approach to conditions in the Mediterranean and Latin America. The PLEIADES Project is outlined in the this flyer (JPG 335 KB).