No abstract

In 2019, the World Economic Forum (2019) listed water crises as the fourth greatest global risk. Securing useable water sources for humanity is a daunting challenge in both scope and scale. Solving these challenges will require comprehensive management of water resources and concerted effort to reduce consumption by agricultural producers, industries, and consumers. Advancements, like the use of recycled water, increase the scope of possible sources for useable water.Recycling converts millions of gallons of wastewater such as storm run-off and sewer effluent into water that meets standards for drinking and is as safe as other drinking water supplies (Asano & Levine, 2004). The water is comprehensively treated using both filters and disinfectants to remove impurities. Use of tap water instead of bottled water addresses issues of pollution by plastics that wind up in water bodies and negatively affect water quality.Use of recycled water addresses issues of supply, particularly for agricultural production which, in the United States, is responsible for 80% of all water consumption (U.S. Department of Agriculture Economic Research Service 2019). However, many consumers are averse to buying both fresh and processed foods that use recycled water (Li et al., 2018;Savchenko, Kecinski, et al., 2019). Numerous studies have shown that individuals develop cognitive biases toward certain foods , which can result in aversion to food technology (Lusk et al., 2015;McFadden & Smyth, 2019;Pakseresht et al., 2017). Though recycled water presents no known negative health risk, consumer bias has been exhibited by reductions in willingness-to-pay for agricultural products that use recycled irrigation water compared to identical products that used conventional is a term commonly used to refer to agricultural practices and commodities produced by processes used by the majority of farms (