Impact of Local Climate on Sugarcane Water Footprint: A Case study of Dangote Sugar Company Numan, Nigeria

Abstract

Assessing the impact of climate on agricultural water demand is essential. Water footprint as an indicator provides a different methodology to the assessment of agricultural water consumption under variability of climate. Here, we analysed the impact of climate variability on the water footprint of sugarcane in Dangote Sugar Company, Numan during 1981-2013. Data used were that of climate, soil and crop parameters. For the soil and crop parameters, the data were unavailable. However, CROPWAT package of the Food and Agricultural Organization contains data on those parameters for different ecological zones that include the study area.. This was used, in addition to 33 years’ climatic data obtained from the Agriculture Department of the Company to model the impact of climate variability on water footprint of sugarcane. Further assessment of this was carried out using the SPSS and SPSS AMOS 21 statistical packages. Results show that there is an evidence of climate variability in the area. Crop evapotranspiration and irrigation water requirements of sugarcane in the study area presented an uptrend and this is due to the variation in climate. Calculated green water footprint (102 m³/ton) and blue water footprint (172 m³/ton) were lower than the global average of 139m²/tons and 57m²/tons respectively. Calculated total (274m²/tons) is also greater than the global average of 210m²/tons. Climatic factors generally account for 17% of the variation in water footprint of sugarcane under the study period. It was established from the results that out of the climatic elements investigated, rainfall is most influential to variations in water footprint of sugarcane. However, there are other agricultural management factors that may also have an effect on it, even higher than that of climate. It was recommended that attention should be given to adaptation of effective strategies to reduce the agricultural production risk associated with climate change in the long run.

Keywords: Climate, CROPWAT, Numan, Sugarcane, Water Footprint