Experimental study on application of saline water irrigation in north-west China

Due to the shortage of fresh water in north-west China, exploitations of saline water become very important for mitigating water shortage for farmland irrigation. In order to research the effect of water and salt transport rule and crop yield under saline water irrigation, the plot experiments under different salinity saline water irrigation and local farmers´ irrigation habit in north-west China was conducted. The results showed that soil salinity will accumulate after irrigated by higher than 5g/L of saline water, and keep balance or leach state after irrigated by lower than 3g/L of saline water. There is positive relationship between the salinity of irrigation water and the inhibition rate of corn growth. The rate of corn growth inhibition had significant positive correlation with irrigation water salinity, the threshold of irrigation water salinity for safety growth of corn was 2.9g/L, and the threshold for suitable planting was 6.1g/L.