In the United States, by contrast, 41% water goes for agriculture, almost all of it for irrigation.

相反，美国41%的水投向了农业，并几乎全都用在了灌溉上。

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As water tables have fallen and irrigation wells have gone dry, China's wheat crop, the world's largest, has declined by 8% since it peaked at 123 million tons in 1997.

由于地下水位下降，灌溉井干涸，居于世界之首的中国小麦产量，已经从1997年1.23亿吨的峰值下降了8%。

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Modern irrigation devices, each capable of spraying 4,5 million liters of water a day, have produced a landscape dominated by geometric patterns of circular green islands of crops.

现代灌溉设备每台的日喷水量可以达到四百五十万升，从而形成了一种像群岛一样的由几何圆形的绿色农田所构成的景观。

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The farmers themselves pay to keep it running. Their new irrigation method has cut water usage by half.

VOA: standard.2009.12.10

Ltd. (GEWP), a for-profit company, has been improving the lives of hundreds of thousands of small farmers and their families by offering affordable water irrigation tools.

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Faculty at the University of Georgia have invented an easy-to-use, GPS-based technology that allows farmers to more accurately target irrigation needs, reducing water consumption by an average of 15 percent.

FORBES: New Technology Reduces Agricultural Water Consumption

The Aral Sea was dried up by upstream diversions of water for vast areas of irrigation.

ECONOMIST: Letters