IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v17y2025i12p5452-d1678327.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Roles of Organic Agriculture for Water Optimization in Arid and Semi-Arid Regions

Author

Listed:
  • Shikha Sharma

    (Plants, Soils, and Climate Department, Utah State University, Logan, UT 84321, USA)

  • Matt A. Yost

    (Plants, Soils, and Climate Department, Utah State University, Logan, UT 84321, USA)

  • Jennifer R. Reeve

    (Plants, Soils, and Climate Department, Utah State University, Logan, UT 84321, USA)

Abstract

Water scarcity is a critical challenge in arid and semi-arid regions, where agricultural water consumption accounts for a significant portion of freshwater use. Conventional agriculture (CA) methods with high reliance on chemical and mechanical inputs often exacerbate this issue through soil degradation and water loss. This review aims to examine how different organic practices, such as mulching, cover cropping, composting, crop rotation, and no-till (NT) in combination with precision technologies, can contribute to water optimization, and it discusses the opportunities and challenges for the adoption and implementation of those practices. Previous findings show that organic agriculture (OA) may outperform CA in drought conditions. However, the problems of weed management in organic NT, trade-offs in cover crop biomass and moisture conservation, limited access to irrigation technologies, lack of awareness, and certification barriers challenge agricultural resilience and sustainability. Since the outcomes of OA practices depend on the crop type, local environment, and accessibility of knowledge and inputs, further context-specific research is needed to refine a scalable solution that maintains both productivity and resilience.

Suggested Citation

  • Shikha Sharma & Matt A. Yost & Jennifer R. Reeve, 2025. "Roles of Organic Agriculture for Water Optimization in Arid and Semi-Arid Regions," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(12), pages 1-16, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:17:y:2025:i:12:p:5452-:d:1678327
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/12/5452/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/12/5452/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:17:y:2025:i:12:p:5452-:d:1678327. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.