Cropping pattern planning under water supply from multiple sources

Abstract

Conventionally, irrigation development planning has been based on cropping pattern selection aiming at maximizing the revenue from irrigation activities. In the real world however, several complexities make the cropping pattern selection a more complicated mathematical problem. Of great interest is the case of water supply from multiple sources (e.g. surface and groundwater) in which a multi-criteria approach is most appropriate. Goal programming has been used in the past to solve cropping pattern selection problems, with criteria of a similar nature, the net benefit being included as a constraint. This paper presents a methodology, based on the fuzzy set theory, for enhancing the goal programming approach to solve similar problems under various sets of criteria of a different nature. In the proposed methodology the net benefit maximization is considered together with all other criteria. The methodology is illustrated using data from the Thessaly Plain in Greece.