Assessment of Agricultural Water Management in Punjab, India, Using Bayesian Methods

Chapter

Abstract

The success of the Green Revolution in Punjab, India, is threatened by a significant decline in water resources. Punjab, a major agricultural supplier for the rest of India, supports irrigation with a canal system and groundwater, which is vastly overexploited. The detailed data required to estimate future impacts on water supplies or develop sustainable water management practices is not readily available for this region. Therefore, we use Bayesian methods to estimate hydrologic properties and irrigation requirements for an under-constrained mass balance model. Using the known values of precipitation, total canal water delivery, crop yield, and water table elevation, we present a method using a Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithm to solve for a distribution of values for each unknown parameter in a conceptual mass balance model. Model results are used to test three water management strategies, which show that replacement of rice with pulses may be sufficient to stop water table decline. This computational method can be applied in data-scarce regions across the world, where integrated water resource management is required to resolve competition between food security and available resources.

Keywords

Agricultural water management Punjab India Markov chain Monte Carlo Groundwater overdraft Mass balance model 
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Notes

Acknowledgments

We thank colleagues at the Punjab Agricultural University (Ludhiana, India), the Central Groundwater Board, and the Bhakra Beas Management Board (both from Chandigarh, India) for sharing valuable data. This work was completed with funding from the Columbia University Earth Institute Postdoctoral Fellowship program and the International Development Research Centre (Canada).

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Copyright information

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015

Authors and Affiliations

  • Tess A. Russo
    • 1
    • 2
  • Naresh Devineni
    • 2
    • 3
  • Upmanu Lall
    • 2
  1. 1.Department of GeosciencesThe Pennsylvania State UniversityUniversity ParkUSA
  2. 2.Columbia Water CenterColumbia UniversityNew YorkUSA
  3. 3.Department of Civil EngineeringThe City College of New YorkNew YorkUSA

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