QUALITY OF LIFE AMONG PHYSICALLY DISABLED FEMALES IN BACKWARD AREAS OF PAKISTAN

Background and Aim: Social discrimination is one of the most fatal and important source of hindrance for women causing them depressed. The aim of this research study was to find important information on QOL of physically disabled women of backward areas (Triple discriminated population of Pakistan). Methodology: The current research was conducted at PRSP, D.I.Khan through Cross sectional survey. Sample size for current study was 300 and SF-36 was used to measure QOL. Data was analyzed by using SPSS 22. Results: The measured mean age of the sample was 27.07 ± 11.10 years. Only 22% of the participants were married. Only 10 3.3% of the participants, completed their tertiary education. The overall SF-36 score was 47.07 ± 12.78. the domains like Physical functioning was 41.33 ± 20.38, Role physical 31.66 ± 35.61, Body pain 74.77 ± 24.06, General health 44.91 ± 14.12, Energy/fatigue 43.16 ± 16.01, Social functioning 49.37 ± 19.80, Role emotional 30.77 ± 36.53, and Mental health 45.97 ± 13.71. This study shows that education has significant impact on the QOL. Conclusion: Physical disability has visible effects on quality of life of Female PWDs. In PWDs management, quality of life needs to be focused in Rehab program for more effective approach.

Soil Water Dynamics and Water Use Efficiency in Maize under Different Irrigation Practices

Field experiments were conducted to study the soil water dynamics and water use efficiency in maize under different irrigation practices. Spring and Summer maize crops were sown for two years. In first experiment, five treatments (flood irrigated flat, furrow irrigated ridge, furrow irrigated raised bed, furrow irrigated raised bed with plastic mulch and sprinkler irrigated flat sowing practices) were used. The results showed that evapotranspiration, grain yield, biological yield, water use efficiency (WUE),(Irrigation water use efficiency (WUEi) and harvest index depended on moisture content under different irrigation practices in both growing seasons. Flood irrigated flat treatment gave the highest evapotranspiration, leaf area index (LAI), crop cover and biological yield, but it did not produce the highest grain yield and gave relatively low WUE and WUEi. Furrow irrigated raised bed treatment significantly improved grain yield, WUE, WUEi and harvest index. The results further showed that IMANSYS model predicted strong correlation between measured and estimated net irrigation requirement and evapotranspiration with r2 values 0.99, 0.99, 0.98 and 0.9) in Spring and Summer sown maize, respectively. Second experiment was conducted to study the deficit irrigation effect on evapotranspiration, WUE and maize yield under different irrigation techniques. Spring and Summer maize crops were sown for two years. Four treatments (furrow irrigated ridge, furrow irrigated raised bed, furrow irrigated raised bed with plastic mulch and sprinkler irrigated flat sowing practices) were used along with 100, 80 and 60 % field capacity (FC). Furrow irrigated ridge (100 % FC) gave the highest evapotranspiration (436.6 and 420 mm), but did not produce the highest grain yield (5.98 and 5.86 Mg ha-1) and gave relatively low WUE (12.2 and 12.9 kg ha-1 mm-1) and WUEi (13.4 and 13.9 kg ha-1 mm-1), respectively for spring 2011 and 2012. Furrow irrigated raised bed along with plastic mulch treatment produced maximum harvest index (0.41 and 0.39) at 80 % FC. Water use efficiency (14.6 and 20.4 kg ha-1 mm-1) and irrigation water use efficiency (17.5 and 21.2 kg ha-1 mm-1) were noted under furrow irrigated raised bed along with plastic mulch and sprinkler irrigated flat treatment at 80 % FC, respectively during spring 2011 and 2012. Results further showed that IMANSYS model predicted strong correlation between measured and estimated net irrigation requirement with r2 values 0.99, 0.99 and 0.9) in Spring and Summer sown maize, respectively. Prediction of soil water contents by HYDRUS was in good agreement with in situ measured data.