Position Statements

Benefits of Irrigated Agriculture

Production agriculture provides food, feed, fuel and fiber necessary to sustain life around the globe.

The global population is expected to grow rapidly — to more than 9 billion in 2050 — resulting in increased demand for agriculture products. Together with growing affluence in many parts of the world and accompanying diet diversification, these changes will require additional agriculture output per person. Thus the imperative for agriculture is to increase output per unit of resource inputs.

Efficient irrigation technologies, products and services are an effective means of increasing agriculture productivity — the amount of agriculture output per unit of applied water.

The Irrigation Association supports the use of efficient irrigation in order to increase agriculture productivity.

Adopted by the IA Board of Directors, December 2010.