Advancing Water Footprint Assessment Research: Challenges in Monitoring Progress towards Sustainable Development Goal 6

Hoekstra, Arjen Ysbert; Chapagain, Ashok; Oel, Pieter van

doi:10.3390/w9060438

Cited by 88 publications

(68 citation statements)

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“…The results show that local management techniques have lower water requirements than standard international usages. These results can be used to improve and to further explore agricultural water use.Agriculture 2020, 10, 8 2 of 11 ensure sustainable ready supplies of freshwater to reduce the number of people suffering from water scarcity [3].Among human activities, agriculture represents 92% of the freshwater footprint [4]. One third of this activity supports farming of livestock.…”

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Long-Term Water Footprint Assessment in a Rainfed Olive Tree Grove in the Umbria Region, Italy

et al. 2019

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Life Cycle Assessment (the systematic analysis of the environmental impact of products during their entire life cycle), Carbon Footprint and Water Footprint assessments play an important role in decision-making processes. These assessments can help guide land management decisions and will likely play a larger role in the future, especially in natural areas with high biodiversity.Agriculture is a substantial consumer of fresh water, so it is important to identify causes and possible solutions to optimize agricultural water use. Water footprint assessments consider water consumption from several points of view and aid in reaching Sustainable Development Goals. Olive trees are a widespread agricultural crop growing in the Mediterranean Basin and are particularly important in the Umbria region in Italy. This paper estimates the water footprint impact related to the production of 1 kg of olives in a rainfed olive orchard managed using low environmental impact techniques. Eleven years of data collection (meteorological data, olives yield data, processes data) are analyzed for typical rural conditions. The results show that local management techniques have lower water requirements than standard international usages. These results can be used to improve and to further explore agricultural water use.Agriculture 2020, 10, 8 2 of 11 ensure sustainable ready supplies of freshwater to reduce the number of people suffering from water scarcity [3].Among human activities, agriculture represents 92% of the freshwater footprint [4]. One third of this activity supports farming of livestock. Several factors of WF are involved in the livestock industry: (a) type of production system, (b) composition, origin and conversion efficiency of the feed and (c) water related to drinking and other on-farm activities [4]. Livestock, particularly red meat, has a very high WF value of 15,400 L of water per kg of final product [5].The WF concept is strictly related to the virtual water concept, with the aim of creating a consumption-based indicator of freshwater use. WF is an ecological footprint indicator, accounting for the appropriation of natural capital, both for the direct and the indirect water use from the consumption and production of good and services. WF can be calculated for a process, a product, a consumer/group of consumers and a producer. The total amount of water involved in a WF assessment can be divided in three components: green, blue and grey water. The green water is the rainwater used to grow crops. The blue water is fresh surface and groundwater. The grey water is the water necessary to return the concentration of the pollutants in the groundwater to the natural balance [6].For vineyards near Palermo, in Sicily region (Italy) WF value for wine production was 700 liters of water use per liter of wine [7]. This WF assessment involved assessing the vineyard (evapotranspiration, irrigation, fertilization, pesticide application) and the winery (washing and cleaning, wine-making, staff water use, bottling and packaging). The green...

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“…Agriculture 2020, 10, 8 2 of 11 ensure sustainable ready supplies of freshwater to reduce the number of people suffering from water scarcity [3].…”

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confidence: 99%

Long-Term Water Footprint Assessment in a Rainfed Olive Tree Grove in the Umbria Region, Italy

et al. 2019

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“…A plethora of options are available to improve water-use efficiencies and productivity [7], but these may not be sufficient to make the conventional water resources-surface water in rivers and lakes, reservoirs, and aquifers-to meet the human needs in many water-scarce areas. Thus, water-scarce countries, regions, and communities should increasingly consider alternate, unconventional water resources in order to narrow the water demand-supply gap [8], as water scarcity forms a risk to the global economy [9] and water is increasingly considered as an instrument for international cooperation to achieve sustainable development [10].…”

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Fog Water Collection: Challenges beyond Technology

Qadir

Jiménez

Farnum

et al. 2018

Water

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Abstract:The Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6, calling for access to safe water and sanitation for all by the year 2030 supports the efforts in water-scarce countries and regions to go beyond conventional resources and tap unconventional water supplies to narrow the water demand-supply gap. Among the unconventional water resources, the potential to collect water from the air, such as fog harvesting, is by far the most under-explored. Fog water collection is a passive, low maintenance, and sustainable option that can supply fresh drinking water to communities where fog events are common. Because of the relatively simple design of fog collection systems, their operation and maintenance are minimal and the associated cost likewise; although, in certain cases, some financially constrained communities would need initial subsidies. Despite technology development and demonstrated benefits, there are certain challenges to fog harvesting, including lack of supportive policies, limited functional local institutions, inexpert communities, gender inequality, and perceived high costs without undertaking comprehensive economic analyses. By addressing such challenges, there is an opportunity to provide potable water in areas where fog intensity and duration are sufficient, and where the competition for clean water is intensifying because water resources are at a far distance or provided by expensive sources.

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“…The availability of water resources is vital for economic and social development [1]. However, with the growth in national economies and the global economy, water scarcity has become a problem in many regions of the world, which has resulted in severe and sometimes violent water conflicts between human needs and ecosystem survival, and as a result has presented great challenges for water resource sustainability [2][3][4]. The 2015 United Nations world water development report stated that "by 2025, two thirds of the global population will face water shortages".…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Quantitative Measurement of the Sustainable Water Resource Development System in China Inspired by Dissipative Structure Theory

et al. 2018

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In an attempt to ensure sustainable water resource development, this paper constructs a comprehensive scientific index evaluation system focused on the macro socio-economic-ecological environment. Inspired by the theory of dissipative structure, the sustainable development system of water resources is regarded as a complex and huge dissipative system. In order to effectively measure the coordinated development status and orderly evolution trend of the system, this paper uses the information entropy method to construct the measurement model of the water resources system and analyze its internal entropy flow changes. The empirical analysis of the water resources in China from 2007 to 2016 found that coordinated water resource subsystem development could achieve sustainable development, and that over the examined period, the sustainable water resource development system in China became more orderly and coordinated; therefore, the sustainable development aim is gradually being achieved.2 of 16 regional, and national economies and have put future development in jeopardy. Therefore, sustainably developing water resources has become increasingly important.However, to accurately develop sustainable water resource development systems, it is necessary to evaluate the sustainability of existing practices and initiatives, explore the impact mechanisms and evolving trends in sustainable water resource development systems, and conduct associated assessments and projections to ensure coordinated development [6]. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to develop a model that is able to accurately evaluate and measure the coordinated development level and the evolutionary trends for sustainable water resources. These developments assist in understanding the current state of the water evolution system and provide recommendations for future sustainable development.The remainder of this article is organized as follows. In Section 2, a comprehensive literature review on sustainable water resource development is given. In Section 3, an indicator system for sustainable water resource development is constructed, and in Section 4, the research methods, applicability, and specific steps are described. In Section 5, a case analysis is given to demonstrate the applicability of the indicator system, and in Section 6, a detailed results analysis is given. The conclusion and future prospects are given in Section 7.

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Advancing Water Footprint Assessment Research: Challenges in Monitoring Progress towards Sustainable Development Goal 6

Cited by 88 publications

References 32 publications

Long-Term Water Footprint Assessment in a Rainfed Olive Tree Grove in the Umbria Region, Italy

Long-Term Water Footprint Assessment in a Rainfed Olive Tree Grove in the Umbria Region, Italy

Fog Water Collection: Challenges beyond Technology

Quantitative Measurement of the Sustainable Water Resource Development System in China Inspired by Dissipative Structure Theory

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