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Quantification of on-farm groundwater use under different dairy production systems in Pakistan [1]

['Muhammad Hassan Farooq', 'Department Of Livestock Management', 'University Of Veterinary', 'Animal Sciences', 'Lahore', 'Muhammad Qamer Shahid']

Date: 2023-02

The objective of this study was to assess the role of production systems and management strategies on groundwater use at dairy farms in Punjab, Pakistan. In a prospective cohort observational study, 14 dairy farms were enrolled from the districts Okara and Kasur, Punjab. The farms were divided into two production systems: 1) peri urban dairy farms, PU (n = 7; herd size 35 ± 10); and 2) rural market oriented dairy farms, RM (n = 6; herd size 32 ± 6; Mean ± SD). One commercial dairy farm with Holstein cows (herd size = 60) was enrolled as a case study. Water flow meters were installed at the groundwater sources and the readings were taken fortnightly for 12 months. Results showed that the amount of daily on-farm groundwater use was higher in the PU dairy farm (117 ± 7 L/buffalo; Means ± SE) compared to the RM farm (80 ± 8). The farms having dirt floor used less water (78 ± 7) than the farms with brick floor (119 ± 9 L/buffalo). Furthermore, the farm having access to surface water used significantly less water (77 ± 10) than the farms having no such facility (120 ± 5 L/buffalo). Groundwater use was highest in July (145 ± 9) and lowest in February (58 ± 15 L/buffalo). The descriptive data from a commercial dairy farm revealed that the average water use during summer months was 844 ± 81 L/cow (Mean ± SD). The current findings conclude that production system, management practices and season greatly influenced on-farm groundwater use at dairy farms.

Funding: This research was funded by Pakistan Science Foundation (PSF, https://psf.gov.pk/ ) awarded to MQS (grant no. PSF/NSLP/P-UVAS-840). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

Copyright: © 2023 Farooq, Shahid. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

The objective of the current study was to assess the role of production systems and management strategies on groundwater use at dairy farms. The study hypothesized that access to surface water sources, types of floors, farm location, and the type of animals at farm would determine the on-farm groundwater use.

Dairy farming is a water intensive activity and accounts for about 20% of agricultural water use [ 4 ]. The on-farm water utilization includes drinking, cleaning, and water application to cool dairy animals during summer. Most of the water is used for cow consumption to support milk production followed by milking parlor cleaning, and barn cleaning [ 4 , 5 ]. However, in areas with sever heat stress, the water use for cooling dairy animal was much greater than drinking [ 6 ]. The temporal analysis indicated that more water is used during summer compared to the winter months [ 4 , 7 , 8 ]. The quantity of water use may vary with production systems and technology used at farm [ 9 ]. A Canadian study found that on average daily 246 L/cow water was used for on-farm activities at dairy farms [ 8 ]. In Pakistan, the debate has begun to rationalize the groundwater usage in agriculture and other industries. Currently, there are limited studies on groundwater use under various livestock production systems in Pakistan making it difficult to identify the efficient water use strategies at farms. This creates a dire need to not only quantify the on-farm groundwater use but also to understand water usage pattern under different production setups. It would help to identify the management areas to be addressed for efficient water use at livestock farms and provide a baseline information to assess groundwater stress due to livestock farming for policy implications.

Sustainable water management is an emerging challenge of the current century to achieve food security in the world. Climate change has aggravated the severity of water scarcity issues especially in the agricultural economies. Pakistan, being a climate vulnerable country, is predicted to face severe water crisis in coming years [ 1 , 2 ]. Furthermore, dwindling surface water supplies due to climate change caused an increased dependency on groundwater reserves for agriculture [ 3 ]. Livestock plays an important role in the livelihoods of millions of smallholder farmers in the country. Dairy farming is one of the major activities in the country and heavily dependent on groundwater utilization for on-farm activities and animal feed production.

All the statistical analyses were performed using SAS 9.4 (SAS Institute Inc., Cary, NC). The herd structure and farmers’ demographic data were descriptively analyzed and presented as percentage. The association of on-farm water use with production system, husbandry practices, and month were subjected to ANOVA. Initially, the univariate model was applied for independent variables and then multivariate models were tested. The final model included production system, month, access to surface water, and floor type as fixed effects and farm as a random effect. The Mixed procedure of SAS was used for analysis and the significance was declared at P ≤ 0.05.

The information collected at farm included herd structure (number of animals; adult, young stock, and calves; type of animals, lactating and dry), husbandry practices (feeding type; green fodder and total mixed ration; farm cleaning practices; housing systems; watering practices at farm), and farmers’ demographics. Written consent of the farmer was obtained. The identity of the farmer was kept secret and was not shared with any third party for any reason. The farmers were given the mineral mixture supplements as an incentive to collaborate in the study.

Continuous flow analog water meters were installed at different farm locations. The farms where only a single groundwater source was present, only one flow meter was installed to measure volumetric water use for all activities. At the commercial dairy farm, 4 water meters were installed for measuring the water used for drinking, cleaning/washing, and showering.

For quantification of water use, the prospective cohort observational study design was used. The enrolled farms were visited from November 2020 to October 2021 fortnightly. Data on herd structure and volumetric water use for on-farm activities were collected at each visit. The research plan was adapted from the previous studies [ 4 , 8 , 9 ].

A total of 14 dairy farms from Punjab province were selected for the study in districts Okara and Kasur of Punjab, Pakistan. Farm selection was based on production systems. Seven dairy farms were enrolled from peri urban areas and 06 farms from the rural areas. One commercial dairy farm was enrolled as a case study. More than 50 farms were visited to get the consent of the farmers to participate in the study. However, only 14 farmers agreed to cooperate in the study. The study plan was approved by the Advanced Studies and Research Board of the University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Lahore, Pakistan (das/1433).

Results

Farmers’ demographics Farmers’ demographics and herd structure is presented in Table 1. All the selected farmers were male with 26.7% of farmers belonging to the age group of up to 20–40 years, 46.7% were between 41–50 years of age and almost 26.7% of the farmers were above 50 years of age. Among all the farmers enrolled, 13.3% were those who were illiterate and had no formal education at all, 53.3% farmers were those who got formal education up to matriculation level, 33.3% of farmers were above matriculation with, and only 1 farmer who got an education at the university level. The 33.3% percent of the farms were those who had 5–15 years of experience in dairy farming, 53.3% had an experience of 16–30 years while only 13.3% farmers had above 30 years of experience in dairy farming. PPT PowerPoint slide

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TIFF original image Download: Table 1. Farmer demographics and herd structure (n = 14). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pwat.0000078.t001

Farm infrastructure and housing The variable related to farm infrastructure is presented in Table 2. Water ponds were available at only 13.3% of the farms. Showers were installed only at commercial dairy farm. while most of the farms (93.3%) did not have this facility. At 66.7% of the farms, no water storage tank was available; the overhead tank was present at 33.3% of the farms. One water trough was present in the majority (53.3%) of the farms and almost 33.3% of farms were those where two water troughs were present and 13.3% of farms had more than 2 water troughs. Almost 33.3% of farms were those where the animals were tethered, 46.7% were keeping the animals loose, and 13.3% were those that were practicing both options. The commercial farm had freestall housing. At 40% of the farms, a dirt floor was present and brick floor was present at 53% of the enrolled farms. The commercial farm had concrete floor. In 40% of the cases, family members were taking care of animals; while paid labor was present at 40% of the farms and mixed labor was present at 20% of the farms. Up to three and eight persons were residing at the farms in 33.3% and 46.7% of the farms, respectively. Nine or above persons were residing at 20% of the farms. Electricity was present at all the farms. PPT PowerPoint slide

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TIFF original image Download: Table 2. Farm infrastructure and type of housing. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pwat.0000078.t002

Farm water sources The descriptive findings about farm water sources are presented in Table 3. Groundwater usage was more common (73.3%) among the farmers compared to the surface water source (26.7%). All the enrolled farms had at least one water pump at their farms. The other water withdrawing machines were hand pumps (at 2 farms), tube wells (02 farms), and the municipal water supply (2 farms). The tube-well/turbine was mainly being used for irrigation of crops and secondly for cooling animals in summer. In 46.6% of the farms, the groundwater level was less than 100 ft, and more than 53.3% of the farms had this level greater than 100 ft. The quality of groundwater was sweet in 53.3% of the farms while 46.6% of farms had brackish groundwater. About 26.7% of the farms had access to the surface water source in summer, mostly canals. Majority of the farmers (73.3%) were not taking their animals to the surface water source. PPT PowerPoint slide

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TIFF original image Download: Table 3. Farm water sources and water quality. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pwat.0000078.t003

Feeding practices Most of the farms were using fresh fodder to feed their animals. Concentrate and cotton seed cake were being offered at some of the farms and only to the milking herd. The commercial farm having Holstein cows was using total mixed ration.

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[1] Url: https://journals.plos.org/water/article?id=10.1371/journal.pwat.0000078

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