Beyond 2020, Vision of the Future: Selected Papers from the Sixth Decennial National Irrigation Symposium

Abstract.Abstract. Highlights ASABE/IA 6th National Irrigation Symposium includes 80 papers, with 36 introduced here in this Special Collection. Papers include current irrigation research about ET, management, turf systems, technology, humid region, water supply. Irrigation in USA is growing more rapidly in humid regions and pressurized irrigation continues to grow in usage. There has been much progress in irrigation science in the last decade, and the vision of the future looks bright. This article introduces the ASABE Special Collection associated with the 6th Decennial National Irrigation Symposium: Beyond 2020, Vision of the Future. This USA symposium, jointly sponsored by ASABE and the Irrigation Association in December 2021, was postponed from 2020 due to the pandemic and consists of approximately eighty presentations, of which thirty six were accepted as journal articles for this Special Collection. Irrigated land area appears to be growing slightly in the USA but is shifting geographically somewhat towards the humid regions. Pressurized irrigation continues to grow, and gravity-fed irrigation continues to decline. Competition for stressed water resources among diverse water users remains great and smaller numbers of irrigation scientists are available to meet the informational needs. Improved ability to acquire, assess and utilize water and crop information help to meet these challenges. This article will discuss irrigation research progress with ET, management, turf systems, sensors and technologies, irrigation strategies within the humid region, and water supply. Challenges and opportunities continue to exist for irrigation in the USA, but progress in the last decade has been steady, and a good vision of irrigation beyond 2020 is anticipated.