Monitoring Irrigated Wheat in Afghanistan: Systematic Literature Review
Abstract
Afghanistan's irrigated agriculture has experienced ongoing drought and reduced water flowing through canals and limited infield monitoring. Such issues contribute to considerable risk to food security and rural livelihoods in districts such as Nad Ali and Argandas. Indices from both remote sensing and geospatial techniques have been used to assess drought, vegetation and land use across multiple regions including Afghanistan. The research was conducted using a systematic literature review (1998–2025) based on the PRISMA methodology. The literature search was conducted using five academic databases: Scopus, Web of Science, Google Scholar, IEEE Xplore, and ACM Digital Library. The search focused on studies published between 1998 and 2025 related to remote sensing, machine learning, irrigation, wheat monitoring, vegetation indices, and Afghanistan or comparable arid regions. In addition, the initial search identified 102 records. After duplicate removal, title and abstract screening, eligibility assessment, and full-text review, 45 studies were included in the final synthesis. Through this review process we identified five significant gaps: there is no location specific for Nad Ali in the reviewed literature, there is an underutilization of NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index) in combination with irrigation information, and there is a need for additional multi-year time series analyses, there is a need for further integration of satellite data with ground truth data (i.e., yield and irrigation records), and there is a need for greater relevance to the socio-environmental conditions of Helmand Province. This study proposes a conceptual framework which includes both multi-temporal time series of Sentinel-2 NDVI (normalized difference vegetation index), NDWI (normalized difference water index) ancillary hydrologic and climatic data, machine learning approaches. This approach is intended to provide a means by which irrigated wheat condition and changes in irrigation can be monitored within Afghanistan, providing a base for future assessments of crops and water, and operationally informing decisions regarding crop-water management.
Authors: Hamid Momand, Watanyoo Suksa-ngiam, Debajyoti Pal, Pornchai Mongkolnam