| |
Population growth, in combination with increasing incomes, is leading to a more nutrient-dense food demand that has driven the agricultural sector to expand the use of water for irrigation, bringing the water crisis to the center of global debate (UnitedNations, 2015). With agricultural sector being the largest user of water at a global level accounting for 70 percent of fresh water withdrawals (Molden, 2007), work focusing on projects related to sustainable agricultural water management practices has shown that shifting to more productive, water-saving technologies is the cornerstone to achieve effective use of agricultural water (FAO, 2017; IFPRI, 2017; United Nations, 2015; World Bank, 2017). The improved effectiveness of water conveyance, the efficiency in its use, and the associated impact on non-water input and output choices have the potential to impact the economic well-being of the farming community and promote the sustainability of agricultural production. The objective of this study is to contribute toward productivity-enhancing policies by estimating the magnitude of gains from the more effective use of water in agriculture. The effectiveness of these policies depends on the proper measurement of water's contribution to agricultural efficiency and productivity. This study develops a measure of water's contribution to total factor productivity (TFP) change that accounts for spatial water quantity and quality adjustments. This spatial model is a first attempt to estimate the contribution of agricultural water's use to productivity of a project and to capture differences in farm-level productivity due to head versus tail disparities in water allocation. As measurement of the terms in the water balance on a spatial case can be challenging, hydrological simulation modeling will be used in this study to estimate the contribution of water to total factor productivity change over space. |
