Study of a smart irrigation system for water managing for potatoes in Chlef region, Algeria

The configuration of the smart irrigation system was designed on the basis of data specific to the parameters concerning characteristics of the plant and the pedological properties of the local soil (permeability, pH, humidity, porosity, etc.), including the meteorological factors. In the Chlef area, the water availability is dependent on meteorological data. The objective of this work is to estimate irrigation water needs in crop gardening (potato) based on a smart irrigation system (SIS). Thus, to ensure an equilibrated growth of crops, we have developed a system with parameters, such as soil moisture and soil temperature, which are the input variables of this smart irrigation system. This system was applied for the irrigation of potatoes (‘Bartina’ variety), planted in the agricultural experimental station of Lard El Beida at Chlef. The results obtained in terms of production yield led to a conclusion that the smart irrigation system allows achieving production of 124.83% with lower water consumption (-19.31%), compared to that of a drip irrigation system. Moreover, the granulometric analysis of the potato tuber size showed that 80.83% of the production is within the size range between 30 mm and 55 mm. By comparison, we observed that 77.4% of products obtained from drip irrigation follow a uniform distribution. We conclude that this smart irrigation system is very economical in terms of water use for gardening crops. Given these encouraging results, it would be wiser to generalize its application and implement it to guarantee food self-sufficiency in the water-deficient regions.