ABSTRACT

This chapter describes the journey of how drip irrigation has become one of the most popular technologies in the field of irrigation and agriculture for professionals and the wider public alike. Most current drip irrigation development takes place outside large-scale public irrigation systems and is largely driven by private initiatives, which makes monitoring more difficult for governmental and international organizations. The first multi-country assessment of the extent of drip irrigation use dates back to 1975. The International Commission for Irrigation and Drainage (ICID) conducted its first worldwide micro-irrigation survey in 1982 and has regularly updated it since. These surveys, however, remain largely incomplete. Agricultural and irrigation engineers working in public and/or international agencies started losing their influence from the mid-1990s onward as drip irrigation travelled from experimental sites to farmers' fields, the political sphere, and global water arenas.