INTRODUCTION
With increasing water needs and diversity of sector
of activity (agricultural, industrial and drinking water),
many countries in the world and particularly in the arid
climate countries are forced to use untreated wastewater
for crop irrigation. According to Scott et al. (2004), 10
% of untreated wastewater is used for irrigation in the
world. In the developing countries, farmers with limited
means use this water because they are less expensive
than conventional water (Keraita & Drechsel, 2004).
The domestic effluent could be used as a good source
of macro-and micronutrients for agriculture to improve
crop yield (Al-Nakshabandi et al., 1997; Papadopoulos
et al., 2009). However, agricultural reuse of this water
has a great health risk (proliferation and transmission
of waterborne diseases) and environmental risk
(degradation of soil quality). Hence, this practice leads
to a soil contamination with high bacterial loads, heavy
metals (HMs) and/or some organic pollutants usually