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"IRRIGATING CROPS WITH SEAWATER" (E.P. GLENN, J.J. BROWN & J.W. O'LEARY).
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Reviews article on experimental study testing feasibility of such irrigation.... More...
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Paper Abstract:
Reviews article on experimental study testing feasibility of such irrigation.
Paper Introduction:
Glenn, Brown, and O'Leary (1998) conducted an experimental study to find and develop crops which could be irrigated by seawater. As the population of the earth increases, the production of food becomes more and more of a problem in order to feed this growing number of people. One of the specific problems facing agriculturalists is the need for water. Fresh water is needed not only for irrigation but also for other human activities, and there is no process that is effective enough at desalinization to provide the volume of water human beings need. The authors also note that the top five plants eaten by people cannot tolerate salt, and these are wheat, corn, rice, potatoes, and soybeans. Since finding enough land and water to produce the foods needed by the world is an urgent problem, the authors ask how the supply of food can be augmented. They answer that one
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The team in conjunction with otherresearchers found about a dozen halophytes showing sufficient promise to begrown under agronomic conditions in field trials. The authors undertook to correct for this by incorporating halophytesas part of a mixed diet for livestock, replacing conventional hay foragewith halophytes making up between 3 and 5 percent of the total foodintake of sheep and goats. Among the concerns raised by the authors as to whether these cropscould be made profitable are locations for growth, sustainability, andpotential damage to other foodstuffs or ecologies, such as have been causedby large-scale coastal shrimp farms. However, to show that these halophytes were cost-effective, it wasnecessary to show that they could replace conventional crops for a specificuse. It isalso not clear from this report whether the increased water intake by theseanimals would be such as to make the change economically unfeasible or not. Scientific American, 76-81.----------------------- 7 Theauthors also note that the top five plants eaten by people cannot toleratesalt, and these are wheat, corn, rice, potatoes, and soybeans. They then screened the halophytes for salt tolerance andnutritional content in the laboratory. However, these animals drankmore water than those without a halophyte diet, compensating for the addedsalt intake. The tests they make and the experiments they conduct aresuggestive, but it is n not yet clear that they have proved that saltwateragriculture will be useful in the future. It is indeed notclear that they can do so, though the authors believe it is possible andthat developing such production will only take time. It is now twentyyears later, and seawater agriculture is still only in the prototype stageof development. The authors also report on other actions undertaken to test theirview that this type of agriculture is feasible, showing different methodsof irrigation and assessing both problems and advantages of this type ofagriculture. Two requirements are noted for such agriculture: 1) seawateragriculture must product useful crops at yields high enough to justify theexpense of pumping water form the sea; and 2) researchers must developagronomic techniques for growing seawater-irrigated crops in a sustainablemanner that does not damage the environment. Such plants are called halophytes. Glenn, Brown, and O'Leary (1998) conducted an experimental study tofind and develop crops which could be irrigated by seawater. The fact that some halophytes have been consumed bydifferent peoples through history suggests that there might be way to usethese products, but it is less clear that this could achieve such a highlevel that it would help with the existing problem of food shortages andwith the needs of a growing population. The authors ask whether seawater agriculture can ever be practiced ona large scale. Reference Glenn, E.P., J.J. Brown, & J.W. This is roughly the yield ofalfalfa grown using freshwater irrigation. Animals fed diets containing Salicornia,Suaeda, and Atriplex gained as much weight as those whose diets includedhay, and the quality of these animals' meat was unaffected by the fact thatthey were eating a diet rich in halophytes. The idea of seawater agriculture is not new and was consideredseriously after World War II. There are between 2, and 3, species of halophytes ranging from grasses and shrubs to trees such asmangroves. The authors estimate that 15 percent of undevelopedland in the world's coastal and inland salt deserts could be suitable forsuch farming. Desert land is plentiful, and so is seawater. Much of the early work did not proveeffective, but it did generate interest and provide good data for furtherstudy. Irrigatingcrops with seawater. The team was certain that theplants were growing almost solely on seawater. The authors want to use themfor food, forage, and oilseed crops: We reasoned that changing the basic physiology of a traditional crop plant from salt-sensitive to salt-tolerant would be difficult and that it might be more feasible to domesticate a wild, salt-tolerant plant (77).Our modern plants alios started as wild pants, of course, and somehalophytes were eaten for generations by native peoples. They answer that one way is to find edible plants which can toleratesaltwater. Many halophytes would serve in that they have high levelsof protein and digestible carbohydrates, but unfortunately, these plantsalso contain large amounts of salt. Theteam irrigated the plants daily by flooding the fields with a high-salineseawater from the Gulf of California. This high salt content also limits theamount of halophytes an animal can eat. The team thus tested whether halophytes could be used to feedlivestock, and this was important in itself because finding enough foragefor cattle, sheep, and goats is one of the most challenging problems facingthe world today. The team flooded the plots with an annualdepth of 2 meters or more of seawater. This means that the high salt content of halophytesdilutes their nutritional value. The rainfall in the region averagesonly 9 millimeters a year. While their examinationsuggested that livestock feed could produced from halophytes because theanimals were not adversely affected, it is not clear that the process woldnot somehow affect the meat or the production of meat over time. However, only asmall portion of available desert is close enough to the sea to make suchirrigation worthwhile. Freshwater is needed not only for irrigation but also for other humanactivities, and there is no process that is effective enough atdesalinization to provide the volume of water human beings need. One of the ways these plants adjust toa saline environment is to accumulate salt. The yields varied among thespecies, and the most productive halophytes produced between one and twokilograms per square meter of dry biomass. Salt has no calories, but itstill takes up space. Suggestions have been made forvarious ways of making this crop valuable and for making use of differentwater sources to produce these crops, but these remain untested. One ofthe specific problems facing agriculturalists is the need for water. To this end, the authors set out to domesticate wild, salt-tolerantplants. At the time, theyexpected to see commercial farming within ten years. Sincefinding enough land and water to produce the foods needed by the world isan urgent problem, the authors ask how the supply of food can be augmented. O'Leary (1998, August). The authors note a number of restrictions in terms of where thesecrops could be grown, but more attention needs to be paid to how thesecrops could be used. They are found in a wide range of habitats, from wet, seacoastmarshes to dry, inland saline deserts. As thepopulation of the earth increases, the production of food becomes more andmore of a problem in order to feed this growing number of people. They also believethat doing so could be spurred by future food needs, economics, and thedegree to which freshwater ecosystems are withheld from increasedagricultural development in the future. The authors began by collecting several hundred halophytes fromaround the world. Seawater agriculture is defined asgrowing salt-tolerant crops on land with water pumped from the ocean forirrigation. Field trials were started in 1978 with the most promising plants inthe coastal desert of Puerto Peņasco on the western cost of Mexico. Several halophyte test farms have been created bydifferent companies in California, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Pakistan,and India, but none have achieved large-scale production. The study conducted by the authors was intended to address thefeasibility of seawater agriculture. They find that it works well in thesandy soils of the desert environment. In the late 197 s, the authors state, they wanted toestablish the feasibility of seawater agriculture.
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