Benefits of irrigation

♤ Increase in crop yield: the production of almost all types of crops can be increased by providing the right amount of later at the right time, depending on its shape of growth. Such a controlled supply of water is possible only through irrigation.

♤ Protection from famine: the availability of irrigation facilities in any region ensures protection against failure of crops or famine due to drought. In regions without irrigation, farmers have to depend only on rains for growing crops and since the rains may not provide enough rainfall required for crop growing every year, the farmers are always faced with a risk.

♤ New areas under cultivation: irrigation brings new areas under cultivation and increases the net area under irrigated cultivation.

♤ Cultivation of superior crops: with assured supply of water for irrigation, farmers may think of cultivating superior variety of crops or even other crops which yield high return. Production of these crops in rain-fed areas is not possible because even with the slight unavailability of timely water, these crops would die and all the money invested would be wasted.

♤ Elimination of mixed cropping: in rain-fed areas, farmers have a tendency to cultivate more than one type of crop in the same field such that even if one dies without the required

amount of water, at least he would get the yield of the other. However, this reduces the overall production of the field. With assured water by irrigation, the farmer would go for only a single variety of crop in one field at anytime, which would increase the yield.

♤ Economic development: with assured irrigation, the farmers get higher returns by way of crop production throughout the year, the government in turn, benefits from the tax collected from the farmers in base of the irrigation facilities extended.

♤ Hydro power generation: usually, in canal system of irrigation, there are drops or differences in elevation of canal bed level at certain places. Although the drop may not be very high, this difference in elevation can be used successfully to generate electricity. Such small hydro electric generation projects, using bulb-turbines have been established in many canals, like Ganga canal, Sarada canal, Yamuna canal etc.

♤ Domestic and industrial water supply: some water from the irrigation canals may be utilized for domestic and industrial water supply for nearby areas. Compared to the irrigation water need, the water requirement for domestic and industrial uses is rather small and does not affect the total flow much. For example, the town of Siliguri in the Darjeeling district of West Bengal, supplies its residents with the water from Teesta Mahananda link canal.