A comparative study on energy balance and economical indices in irrigated and dry land barley production systems

This study was conducted to determine how energy balances and economical indices of barley production are affected by irrigated and dry land farming systems. Data were collected from 26 irrigated and 68 dry land barley farms. The complimentary data were collected through questionnaires filled by farmers in face-to-face interviews during 2010. The results indicated that total energy input for irrigated barley was 19,308.96 MJ ha^?1 and for dry land barley was 7,867.82. The non-renewable energy was about 66.83 and 71.02 % in irrigated and dry land systems while the renewable energy was 33.17 and 28.98 %, respectively. Energy use efficiency is energy output MJ ha^?1 divided by energy input MJ ha^?1. Energy use efficiency was 5.3 and 3.96 in dry land and irrigated systems, respectively. Although net return in the irrigated system (266.13$ ha^?1) was greater than that in the dry land system (208.64) but the benefit to cost ratio in irrigated system (1.38) was lower than that in the dry land system (1.58). Results showed that human labor as well as machinery energy inputs were the most important inputs influencing the dry land and irrigated barley production systems, respectively. The second important input in the irrigated barley was electricity (with 0.16) which was followed by water for irrigation and diesel fuel (0.14 and 0.13, respectively). In total energy consumption, the ratio of non-renewable energy was greater than that of renewable energy. Since the main non-renewable energy input was diesel, electricity, and chemical fertilizers; therefore, management and improvement in the application of these inputs would increase the proportion of renewable energy.