Population explosion of the twentieth century and rapid shrinking of cultivable lands have given a tight challenge with respect to food security. However, due to behavioural and food habit changes we have moved to water intensive crops. Like due to increase in consumption of sugar, the sugarcane cultivation has increased. So goes the wheat cultivation due to shifts in consumption of wheat based products from millets over the past couple of centuries. Both sugarcane and wheat are known as Water Intensive crops or Crops with highest embodied water. For instance, it takes 1,340 cubic meters of water (based on the world average) to produce one tonne of wheat and 2100 cubic meters of water for producing a kg of Sugar. What is even more disastrous is the fact that these crops are chosen to be grown in already water stressed regions, like Sugarcane is grown in Mandya relying on Kaveri river water when there is an ongoing fight for Kaveri river water for drinking purposes. Alternative to river water, farmers end up drawing water from deep tubewells to meet the embodied water requirement.

Is there a solution to this?
Agriculture never demands fresh water. Agricultural demands can easily be met if the civic authorities come up with the idea of ‘Treated Water Canals’. About 200 kld of Bengaluru waste water is processed at Bidadi, but what next? It is left out in the river stream. Mandya, which is in close vicinity of Bidadi, can benefit from this, considering the gravitational advantage Bengaluru has over Mandya. There was a pilot done in the name of ‘Koramangala Challaghatta Valley’ project, which uses treated water to fill the lakes in dry areas of Kolar and Chikaballapura. This has to be extended further by ensuring good efficacy of water treatment.

Food crops thrive in treated water and it is a good way to give back nutrients to the plants. There is no WASTE water, there is only WASTED water. Negating use of dam water for agriculture and using treated water for growing crops gives us both a Food and Water Secure future.