The Effects of Using Magnetic Treatment Brackish Water in Irrigation on the Yield Medical Herbs "Origanum Vulgare" Pilot Project: AL-Uja Area/Lower Jordan Valley-West Bank

Al Uja area locates in the Lower Jordan Valley area, about 5 km to the north of Jericho city at about 280 m below sea level. The area considers an excellent agricultural site due to the fertile, availability of water and its warm climate during winter months. This location makes it unique to grow different crops during winter season. The major sources of irrigation water are the Al Uja spring with annual discharge range between 0.5 and 8 MCM of fresh water (0.7 mS/cm), and 7 Groundwater boreholes with average annual abstraction of 3.5 MCM of brackish water (2.5-6 mS/cm) (Hötzl and Wolf, 2011). Al Uja spring drain water from the karstic Mountain carbonate aquifer system with high fluctuation in discharge rate (Schmidt et al, 2013) (Guttman, 2007), this cause dependent on brackish groundwater. Increase of groundwater salinity is causing restriction of planting certain crops and limited to high tolerate salinity crops with relatively low cash income (Manasra et al, 2013). During the last decade Palestinian farmers start to grow medicine herbs for external market. In 2015, 60 tones of medicine herbs are exported from the Jordan Valley area (Data Base Ministry of Agriculture), from this Oregano cultivation make about 70 % of the exported Medicine Herbs. The study aim to assist applying treated magnetized water in irrigation of Oregano.

Herbs like Oregano, Thymine, Tarragon, Salvia, Rosemary, and other medical plants are well known herbs by the population in the Eastern Mediterranean Basin, and are historically still used in tradition medicine since many centuries (Azaizeh et al, 2006; Saad et al, 2005; Yeşilada et al, 1995). Medical herbs are also used in cosmetic, herbal tea, species, liqueurs, insecticides, fungicides and pharmaceutical industry. The essential oils can inhabit the growth of moulds and food borne bacteria (Paster et al, 1990). (Alçiçek et al, 2004; Symeon et al, 2009), reported also an improvement of broiler growing by adding wide medical herbs to the dietary. 

In European, the cultivated area with medical herbs was about 70000 hectares in 2013(Spychalski, 2013) . France, Hungary and Spain are the main producers. Other hand Europe countries imported in 1996 about 440 000 ton of medical herbs which is about ¼ of the global production at a value of 1.3 billion US$ (Farnsworth and Soejarto, 1991; Lange, 1998)

In the West Bank/Palestine, the natural growing locations of these herbs are along the mountain ridges where semi humid to semi arid climatic zones dominates. In this zones the annual rainfall is above than 350 mm (Azaizeh et al, 2006). Due to the high demand of the international markets, and the good prices especially during winter season, Palestinian farmers started to cultivate this type of crops since the last decade in the Lower Jordan Valley. Oregano cultivated land in the western part of the Jordan Valley (West Bank) increase from 4 hectares to 20 hectares during the year 2015 (Ministry of Agriculture 2015). To overcome the negative impact of saline water in irrigation of different crops. The United Stated Agency for International Development (USAID) started pilot projects of using magnetized treated brackish water in irrigation of different crops including medical herbs, namely Oregano, and Tarragon in Al Uja area. The selection of these crops is due to the high demand in international market, the climate of Jordan Valley during winter season provide earlier production comparing to other producing regions which start the production during last spring and in summer season. The main objective of this study was to assist the affect of using magnetize treated water in irrigation of on the yield of Oregano under green house condition.

 Many authors reported a positive effect of using treated magnetized water in irrigation of different crops, for example (PIRZAD et al, 2013) reported an improvement of using magnetic saline water on germination and seedling growth of Lathyrus Sp.(Ul Haq et al, 2012) reported also an increasing in seedling growth, yield, plant height, root mass of Radish using Pre-sowing magnetic field water treatment. (Abdul Qados, 2011) also reported an improvement irrigated Lentil plant with treated magnetic water in term of plant height, fresh and dry weight, water contents chlorophyll a , a+b, total pigment, total phenol. (Maheshwari and Grewal, 2009) studied the effects of using magnetic treated water with different salinity contents on irrigation of snow pea, celery and pea plants, he reported a significant increase in plant yield and water productivity. (Nasher, 2008) reported also an increase on the growth of chick-pea crop. (El-Latif et al, 2014) studied the effect of exposing the maize seedling, and he reported that the highest growth rate of maize roots to 5 mT magnetic fields, as well as on root growth.(Aladjadjiyan, 2002; Esitken, 2003; Kinouchi et al, 1996) reported that using magnetized water can decrease the soil alkalinity, increase the mobility of fertilizers, and increase the yields. (Bogatin et al, 1999) studied the effect of magnetic treatment of irrigation water on the quality of irrigation, and he found that the flow rate through the apparatus, water carbonate hardness of more than 50 mg and pH value of more than 7.2 are important factors affecting the impact of treatment.