African Journal of Agricultural Research Vol. 6 (33), pp. 6776-6779, 30 December, 2011 Available online at http://www.academicjournals.org/AJAR DOI: 10.5897/AJARX11.029 ISSN 1991-637X ©2011 Academic Journals Review A review on the enhancement of rice production in paddy field with minimum input of water M. A. Talpur 1 , Ji Changying 1 *, S. A. Junejo 3 , T. Guangzhao 1 , A. A. Tagar 1,2 and F. A. Chandio 1 1 Department of Agricultural Mechanization, College of Engineering, Nanjing Agricultural University, Post Code 210031, Nanjing, P.R. China. 2 Department Land and Water Management, Faculty of Agricultural Engineering, Sindh Agriculture University, Tandojam, Pakistan. 3 Department of Hydrology, School of Earth science and Engineering, Nanjing University, P. R. China. Accepted 19 December, 2011 Fresh water resources are decreasing globally, because of climate change and increasing competition of industrial and urban development. Scarcity of water resources in world’s leading rice-producing countries, such as China and India has threatened the production of rice crop, which is the main staple food in Asia, particularly China, India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Vietnam and Pakistan. Hence increasing demand of rice needs more attention towards this crop production globally. On the other hand it is an aquatic crop; needs more water as compared to wheat, maize etc. Therefore it is imperative to investigate the ways to get good yield with minimum input of water. In this context, an effort has been made to review the water saving techniques for the enhancement of rice production in paddy field with minimum input of water. Key words: Water saving techniques, yield, growth of rice crop. INTRODUCTION According to United Nations world population has reached to 7 billion, a mile stone in human history. UNFPA reported most of the population growth will happen in developing countries. World has been changing over the last decade politically and economically in significant ways. However, food security still remains an unfulfilled dream; there has been progress on a global scale - but not for all. In order to meet the population pressure crop yields from each unit of land harvested must be increased by intensifying production. A considerable increase in overall production is essential and is a major challenge for extended land and water resources. Future yield increases may be limited compared to past trends (FAO, 2006), but by 2030, food production must double to keep pace with demand (Friedrich and Gustafson, 2007). On the other hand annual amount of available water resources for agriculture is decreasing globally because of climate change and increasing competition of industrial and urban development. Scarcity of freshwater resources, *Corresponding author. E-mail: chyji@njau.edu.cn. such as in the World’s leading rice-producing countries China and India has threatened the production of the flood-irrigated rice crop (Singh et al., 2006). To keep up with increasing demand for food combined with increasing water scarcity, several water-saving techniques, such as alternate wetting and drying (Cabangon et al., 2003) and aerobically grown rice have been developed in order to increase water productivity (that is, grain yield over water input, WP) of rice production (Waqar et al., 2007). It is estimated that a total irrigation potential of some 402 million ha in developing countries, of which half is currently in use. However, water resources will be scarce in South Asia, which will be using 41% of its renewable freshwater resources by 2030, the North/ East Africa; will have 58% of the total amount of fresh water produced annually. To meet increased demand of other sectors, these areas will need to free additional water resources by achieving greater efficiency in irrigation water use (FAO, 2002). The pressure to reduce water use in irrigated agriculture is mounting, especially in Asia where it accounts for 90% of total diverted fresh water. Rice crop is an apparent