Water quantity management
If well managed, groundwater can and should act as a powerful climate adaptation option, a natural insurance mechanism, and not just a component of freshwater supplies. OECD (2015), Drying Wells, Rising Stakes: Towards Sustainable Agriculture Groundwater Use
Zooming in on agriculture and water quantity management
groundwater for irrigation leads to the lowering of water tables, reducing its potential for future use. It can also generate multiple negative
Agriculture faces the enormous challenge of producing
externalities, including salinity, stream depletion,
more with less water. Globally agriculture needs to
or land subsidence that directly affect agricultural
produce almost 50% more food by 2030 and double
productivity, water users and the environment.
production by 2050. This will likely need to be achieved with less water. At the same time, there will be
The 2015 OECD report Drying Wells, Rising Stakes:
growing pressures from urbanisation, industrialisation
Towards Sustainable Agriculture Groundwater Use provides
and climate change. In this context, it is critical
a comprehensive review of agriculture groundwater
that farmers receive the right signals to increase
management instruments. It identifies a combination
water use efficiency and improve agricultural water
of policy measures to alleviate the negative effects of
management, whilst preserving aquatic ecosystems.
agricultural groundwater use and sustain the capacity of aquifers for the future. It emphasises in particular
In the 2010 report Sustainable Management of Water
the need for governments to invest in groundwater
Resources in Agriculture, the OECD analyses the challenges
information systems to properly manage groundwater,
of moving towards more efficient management of water
which remain incomplete and insufficient in many OECD
resources in agriculture, and responding to growing
countries. In regions with intensive groundwater use, the
food demands and the impacts of climate change.
OECD recommends employing a “tripod” combination
Groundwater provides a highly important
of regulatory, economic and collective action policy
resource for agriculture to cope with increasingly
approaches, customised to local circumstances.
variable water supplies. However, intensive use of
KEY PUBLICATIONS OECD (2015), Water Resources Allocation: Sharing Risks and Opportunities, OECD Studies on Water, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/9789264229631-en OECD (2015), Drying Wells, Rising Stakes: Towards Sustainable Agricultural Groundwater Use, OECD Studies on Water, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/9789264238701-en
OECD WORK ON WATER
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