About AquaCrop
AquaCrop is a crop growth model developed by the Land and Water Division of FAO to address food security and to assess the effect of environment and management on crop production. AquaCrop simulates yield response to water of herbaceous crops and effectively addresses conditions where water is a key limiting factor in crop production. The design of the model pursued an optimum balance between simplicity, accuracy and robustness.
To be widely applicable, AquaCrop uses only a relatively small number of explicit parameters and mostly intuitive input variables, requiring simple methods for their determination. At the same time, basic and often complex biophysical processes form the basis of calculation procedures in order to guarantee an accurate simulation of the crop response in the plant-soil system.
Practical applications
AquaCrop can serve as a planning tool, and it can assist management decisions in both irrigated and rainfed agriculture.
Key documents
AquaCrop is particularly useful for:
- understanding crop responses to environmental change (i.e. as an educational tool);
- comparing attainable and actual yields in fields, farms and regions;
- identifying constraints to crop production and water productivity (e.g. as a benchmarking tool);
- developing irrigation schedules for maximum production (e.g. seasonal strategies and operational decision-making, and for climate scenarios);
- developing strategies under water-deficit conditions to maximize water productivity through:
- irrigation strategies (e.g. deficit irrigation);
- crop and management practice (e.g. adjusting planting dates, cultivar selection, fertilization management, the use of mulches, and rainwater harvesting);
- irrigation strategies (e.g. deficit irrigation);
- studying the effect of climate change on food production (for example by running AquaCrop with both historical and future weather conditions);
- analyzing scenarios useful for water administrators and managers, economists, policy analysts, and scientists (i.e. planning purposes);
- supporting decision-making on water allocations and other water policies.
Constraints
AquaCrop is designed to predict crop yields at the single field scale (point simulations). The field is assumed to be uniform without spatial differences in crop development, transpiration, soil characteristics or management.
Only vertical incoming (rainfall, irrigation and capillary rise) and outgoing (evaporation, transpiration and deep percolation) water fluxes are considered.
Target audience
AquaCrop is intended mainly for practitioners working for extension services, governmental agencies, non-governmental organizations or farmer associations.
It is also be useful to scientists and as a training and education tool on the role of water in determining crop productivity.