ABSTRACT
In 1990, 250 million hectares of land were under irrigation worldwide; supplying a third of the world’s harvested crops and agriculture was the primary use for water in two out of three countries.Agricultural water use is particularly high in arid areas such as the Middle East, North Africa and the southwestern United States, where rainfall is minimal and evaporation so high that crops must be irrigated most of the year. Afghanistan and Sudan apply an estimated 99 percent of all the water they use to agriculture.
