Factors affecting crop water use efficiency: A worldwide meta-analysis

Abstract Water is a limiting natural resource for agricultural production. While it is well accepted that crop types differ in their water use efficiency (WUE), there is no consensus on the main factors affecting WUE of main field crops, which was the motivation of the current study. The effects of rainfall pattern, soil type and climatic regime on crop WUE were evaluated using data from 514 experiments around the world published in ISI journal papers. The results confirmed that crop type had a significant effect (p