Folk Irrigation Technologies: Historical Heritage and Lessons for the Present

Abstract

Central Asia, notably, Uzbekistan is one of the cradles of ancient civilizations practicing irrigated agriculture. Traditionally, water management has been a driver shaping the economic, social, and cultural development of this specific type of society. The traditional folk irrigation technologies, such as sepoya, chorpoya, damba, and aqueducts, that is to say, that the adaptations to the arid weather and complex hydrological conditions of the region were developed by local masters to align with the peculiarities of the environment to help development. The master-centred water supply and distribution system, these devices constructed from life-supporting materials, that is to say, wood, and stone. They represent pragmatic engineering embedded into the ecology. For these reasons, from the point of view of nature, these technologies have both historical and technical necessity, but there has been little research to date on how such models embody the principles of sustainability and efficiency of works and community water management. The purpose of the study was therefore to analyze the history of these indigenous irrigation systems, their structural features and socio-ecological functions, as for the relevance of the use of these technologies in modern water management. The study is based on the fact that traditional irrigation factors prevent the ecological imbalance caused by natural water filtration, provide hydraulic pressure and do not require overloading of resources that allows maintaining team pollination and balanced irrigation water, sustainable for land area and land resources. It should be also highlighted that many postulates of these technologies, subsequent to the invention of scientific hydraulics, were familiar in the form of eco-engineering concerning the characteristics of minimal irrigation and natural water treatment, self-regeneration, and nature of the degree of freedom.