The conference of the Institute of Agricultural, Fisheries, Food and Ecological Production Research and Training of Andalusia (Ifapa) that has been held in the Community of Irrigators of Palos de la Frontera has had the objective of showing the producers of red fruits of Huelva how to save water by keeping production at the same or even higher levels.

Water is a scarce good and it is necessary to optimize it while maintaining the profitability of the crops, this is the philosophy that moves the Ifapa researchers who have presented a free APP, created by themselves, to help farmers to have the control your crops.

The day has served so that the investigators present the results of carried out in the last campaign and the comparison of the results of more than a decade of trials.

In general terms, the researcher Nativity Ruiz Baena, recommends doing a good irrigation planning taking into account the factors that can influence both external and internal. He has affirmed that an irrigation system with probes "helps to know the state of the crop and gains in efficiency".

The question is to maintain production saving water, fertilizers, phytosanitary, etc. Ruíz Baena assures that an over-irrigation, for example in blueberries, does not increase production. It is a statement made by Natividad Ruíz after more than a decade of essay campaigns.

Result

Thus it has been proven that spending a 20% less water Usually the same production is achieved and that spending 20% ​​more than usual water does not increase production significantly, however the cost of water and fertilizers is an important increase to take into account.

He recommends making use of the weekly irrigation charts that Ifapa provides for free and that is available to farmers and technicians. It is convenient, he said, to maintain a high irrigation pulse since cuts do not improve production results. Ruíz has stressed that having a system of drip irrigation It does not mean efficiency. For this, you have to do proper planning and have a good irrigation schedule.

You also have to take into account the factors climatological or evapotranspiration inside the greenhouse that will always be inferior to the one that exists outside.

Natividad Ruíz presented the results and a comparison of the last field trials on blueberry, although very similar have been those obtained in previous campaigns in other red fruits such as strawberry and raspberry.

Berry Irrigation APP

El investigador Pedro Gavilan presented the RiegoBerry APP, a typing tool designed by Ifapa technicians and which is available to farmers and technicians for free.

The objective of this application is to give the appropriate guidelines so that the farmer obtains the maximum production and at the same time optimizes the use of water no water stress.

This application is available for crops of strawberry, raspberry and blueberry.

At the opening of the day were the president of the Community of Irrigators of Palos de la Frontera, Fernando Sánchez, and the territorial delegate of the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries of the Junta de Andalucía, Alvaro Burgos.

Both stressed the importance of agriculture in Huelva for the province and for Andalusia as engine of wealth and employment. "It is essential to help the sector that does so much for the economy of the province, the administrations have the obligation to investigate to find solutions to their problems and prepare their future with the aim that red fruits continue to be a power", stressed Alvaro Burgos.

He thanked the Community of Irrigators of Palos for the welcome and collaboration with Ifapa while Sánchez stressed the importance of making correct use of water, as it is a scarce good.