Surface Irrigation

Surface irrigation is water that is applied to the surface of a farm field using gravity. As the most used type of irrigation in the world, surface irrigation is ideal where irrigation water is available in plenty. One of the upsides of surface irrigation is it does not need any technology to work. It needs a careful design where the size of the farm field, slope from the water source, soil type, and gradient of the farm field is put into consideration. 

With surface irrigation, the farmer will incur high initial costs, mainly labour costs but the cost of maintaining the system is low. 

Advantages of surface irrigation

👉Does not require technical expertise or equipment to construct and run. 

👉Can be done by any farmer, including small scale farmers since it does not require much input apart from labour.

Disadvantages of surface irrigation

👉Requires level land and cannot work well on sloped land

👉Works well only with soils with low filtration

👉Once the land is flooded, this method does not allow mechanization using tractors or other mechanical methods of ploughing.

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