WEED SUPPRESSION ENHANCES WATER USE EFFICIENCY OF CEREAL CROPS

Water-use efficiency (WUE) is considered as an important determinant of yield under stress and as a component of crop drought resistance. This paper is reviewing and discussing various concepts that define water use efficiency in agriculture, review the crop water use efficiency and how it can be improved by supplement irrigation and weed management. There are different factors that affect crop water use efficiency, which include crop physiological characteristics, genotype, soil characteristics such as soil water holding capacity, meteorological conditions and agronomic practices. Plant with high water use efficiency have high yield and adaptation in arid and semi-arid environment. A lot of study reported that weed management and supplement irrigation increase WUE of cereal crop significantly. Weeds are the major competitors for resources such as soil water, minerals, light with crops and this competition lead to decrease in crop yield and growth. Based on the different Scientifics findings, it could conclude that weeds need more water than many crops and many weeds are known to be “water wasters”. Under water stress condition weeds can cut crop yields more than 50% through moisture competition. Effective control of weeds leads to more efficient use of water. Then improving water use efficient by managing weed in the field is one of the crucial methods that has been verified and reported by many scientists. Knowledge of weed management and irrigation in arid environments affect plant growth and improve water use efficiency. Such knowledge is also important to increase grain yield for sustainable cereal production which will help in food security in semi-arid zone.