Is improving Nile water quality ‘fruitful’?

Abstract

Egypt's irrigation systems are inefficient; the use of water is profligate and soil salinity levels have risen. This has reduced agricultural yields and biased production patterns away from high value crops in favour of salt resistant crops. The need to improve irrigation water quality is accentuated by increasing demand for, and declining supplies of, water resources. This study uses a computable general equilibrium model, calibrated to an extended SAM and detailed satellite accounts for water quality, to assess the impacts of the huge investments needed to raise water quality. The results indicate strong positive economy-wide impacts in Egypt, which exceed the investment cost. Income increases by 4% and induce 24 increases in the production of high-value crops; i.e., fruits (almost triple), seasonal 25 vegetables (30-37%) and rice by (13%) with a 64% increase in rice exports. The 26 study illustrates the importance of including water quality as a variable in the 27 analyses of water systems.

How to improve agricultural value-added in the MENA region? Implementation of Diamond Porter's theory in agriculture

“…For example in Tunisia, inefficient water use causes a loss of economic value, including in agriculture, amounting to 470 million Tunisian Dinars (Chebil et al, 2019). Meanwhile, inefficiency has resulted in lower agricultural yields and production patterns that are tilted away from high-value commodities in Egypt (Osman et al, 2019). Finally, Iran will have to spend a lot of money to enhance agricultural management (Tahbaz, 2016).…”

A review of macroeconomic models for the WEFE nexus assessment

“…We can further extend the WEF nexus by including an additional aspect, namely the Ecosystems. Since water and crop issues are closely related to ecosystem dynamics, in the next paragraph we focus on those studies that consider the direct impact of climate change on ecosystems' characteristics, such as soil salinity (Osman et al, 2019) and erosion (Sartori et al, 2019), and the agricultural production (Kahsay et al, 2017;Khan et al, 2020;Vatankhah et al, 2020) .…”

“…Ecosystem characteristics can also be considered in the CGE models to improve the evaluation of policies promoting food security and human health. For example, Osman et al (2019) illustrate the importance of including water quality in the analysis of water systems and assess the impacts of investments to improve its quality in Egypt. The outcoming results underline significant potential economic benefits from addressing irrigation-water quality problems.…”

Can the Nile Generate Output, Income and Employment in Egypt? A Mixed Multiplier Analysis

“…The lack of the cost-related data might produce a slight overestimation of the results. Previous analyses conducted for Egypt (Osman et al, 2019) demonstrate that improving irrigation water quality has strong positive economy-wide impacts which compensate for the costs associated to the water quality improvement projects. With noticeable expansions in high-value crops (i.e., fruits, seasonal vegetables, and rice), income increases by 4%.…”

“…Since water scarcity is the predominant issue, improving water quality is the only feasible way to enhance agricultural productivity and efficiency. Better water quality boosts income by 4% and induces increases in the production of high-value crops with a 64% increase in rice exports (Osman et al, 2019).…”