Infectious Diseases and Pandemic Threats in Africa: Analysis of Behavioural Change Theories and Multi-Dimensional Heterodox Responses for Sustainable Solution

This study was conducted to determine appropriate irrigation amount, fruit quality and water-yield relationship for date palm under dry conditions. The research work was carried out in Alkharj, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, for two consecutive seasons (2016-2017) and (2017-2018). The treatment contained four irrigation water amounts, (ETC 100%, ETC 75% and ETC 50%) of date palm tree water requirement and the amount of water actually used (control). A mature date palm trees (Segae variety) of the same age (10 years) were selected randomly to perform the experiment in both seasons. The experiment was organized in Complete Block Design (CBD) and the analysis was done using SPSS. The measured parameters were water productivity (kg/m3 ), yield parameter’s (weight of date fruit /g and productivity kg/tree), and quality parameter’s ( moisture content (%), total soluble solid (TSS %), Brominated (%) of date fruit and Veneer (%)). Moreover, the quality of irrigation water used, was assessed and compared with FAO standard for irrigation water. The result showed that the water quality was found within the permissible level of FAO standard for irrigation water. The result also indicated that the amount of water using in the study area, is more than the actual amount of water needed by date palm tree (ETc100%) according to the local weather. Moreover, the water treatment (75% ETc) showed the highest significant differences (P≤ 0.05) of water productivity, moisture content, and (TSS%). While water treatment (100% ETc) revealed the highest values of productivity in both seasons followed by (75% ETc). Moreover, the Brominated and Veneer values were found within the recommended level according to the local standard. However, the water treatment (50% ETc) showed a high significant difference (P≤ 0.05) in compared with others treatments. This study concluded that date palm can growth perfectly with high yield and product quality with water regime ETc 75%. Therefore, huge amount of water can be saved when adopting this regime for date palm production. Keywords: Deficit irrigation; Date palm; Water productivity; Date palm fruit quality