Virtual Water Trade in the Middle East

Many countries around the world have been inadvertently implementing a virtual water strategy for many years simply because the volume of drinking water available for local food production has not been enough to meet growing demands (Wichelns 2001).

Based on Allan (1997), the water scarce Center East region may be for more than a decade relying on the global freshwater surplus to balance its deficit and achieve drinking water protection for its economies via digital water industry. Clearly North America is by far the greatest digital water exporter within the world, while Central and South Asia constitutes the greatest virtual drinking water importer.

Central and South Asia is the largest area in terms of population, so food demand is higher than in the other regions, which explains the high virtual drinking water import into this region. As for that Center East region, it is just a net importer of virtual drinking water (30.3 Gm3/yr). It imports virtual water in agricultural plants primarily from North America (12.1 Gm3/yr), whilst its export activity is primarily inter-regional (5.13 Gm3/yr).

Syria is really a net exporter of virtual water (264 - 609 M3/capita), but in most nations, including Iraq, Lebanon, and Palestinian Authority, virtual water has been imported independent of a clear and holistic national water management technique. While external water assets had been being sought unintentionally, existing drinking water resources had been being exploited inefficiently and unsustainably, especially within the agricultural sector.

Only Jordan and Israel have created conscious policy choices to reduce or abandon exports or nearby manufacturing of water intensive plants and replace them by imports or greater return plants to allow optimization of drinking water use (Hoekstra and Hung 2005). Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian Authority are possible digital drinking water importers, while Iraq, Syria and Lebanon are potential exporters.

As this kind of, Lebanon appears to become the only nation that isn't assuming the possible part in virtual industry Except for Israel and Jordan, who are already functioning on managing their scarce water assets efficiently, countries in the Middle East can seriously advantage from the concept of virtual drinking water trade by very first managing their drinking water sector locally through proper policy setting.

The following step would be to improve financial development and development by adopting policies that enable or encourage international trade patterns that reflect water scarcity. Nevertheless, this kind of a step demands careful thing to consider of various fundamental issues and national objectives, including problems of nationwide and food protection, economic growth, and quality of existence.

In this context, governments may opt for further promotion of virtual water imports to alleviate their water difficulties, and therefore significantly altering cropping patterns. Accordingly, the government would need to focus on establishing viable and powerful industrial and services sectors to fund the purchases of virtual drinking water from the international marketplace (Yang and Zhender 2002).

This might be enhanced by channeling the drinking water in the agricultural sector to other sectors which have greater worth of water use and that already suffer from water shortage. Diversifying the economy to industry and service sectors, particularly tourist sector for the region's geographical proximity to Europe and also the Gulf and its rich history and cultural heritage, ought to be taken as holistic measures in dealing with drinking water scarcity.

Of course, this should inevitably take into consideration the dominating role played by socio-economic development at big, such as needed off-farm job opportunities as rampant unemployment is really a problem in these Middle Eastern nations. About the other hand, the agricultural sector in the countries under study is of great socio-economic importance despite the fact that it's the lowest contributor to GDP.

It is a major source of livelihood for many households and in many cases supplements loved ones income. Additionally, irrigated agriculture contributes to poverty alleviation in poor, rural areas inside these countries.

Hence, there are many actions that need to become undertaken to ensure that no additional stress is exerted on the already scarce resources and to maximize the environmental and economic benefits of the flow of virtual water into and out of these countries.

Very first, an efficient engagement is required towards agricultural policy reform that focuses on formulating a demand-oriented water management approach within the irrigated agriculture sector through institutional reinforcement, water pricing reform and agricultural sector adjustment based on a virtual water industry analysis.

Accordingly, the adoption of relevant guidelines are needed concerning prices and resource allocation to influence how land, drinking water, and other inputs are utilized by farmers and firms in manufacturing.

Exporting higher-value money plants and importing lower-value cereal plants ought to be encouraged by motivating farmers to think about the true delivery and chance expenses of water via well-defined drinking water rights and signals of waterscarcity worth.

Additionally, water ought to be dealt with as an economic commodity instead of a public great, all whilst addressing social implications, along with a pricing structure ought to be established to allow full price recovery of operation and upkeep expenses as well as part of the initial purchase.

Water tariffs ought to consider into consideration socio-economic conditions, drinking water availability, irrigation method, cropping intensity, etc and ought to be simple to administer. In irrigation schemes exactly where farmers have entry to both surface and groundwater, drinking water tariffs should be set lower than or equal towards the private cost of pumping groundwater to avoid farmer
over-exploitation of this resource.

Institutional strengthening and administrative reforms of water management agencies through decreased federal government involvement and bureaucratic control ought to be pursued. The establishment of drinking water user associations (WUA) may help in organizing drinking water charges collection and ensuring the proper maintenance of irrigation schemes.

Second, agricultural policies that encourage the production of competitive plants this kind of as higher worth added crops (fresh fruits and vegetables) as nicely as organically grown create tailored primarily for that export marketplace should be developed.

Third, macroeconomic guidelines ought to be set to influence farm-level decisions concerning crop choices in methods which are consistent with accurate opportunity expenses. For example, government guidelines in Lebanon raise the currency's exchange rate above its true market value.

An over-valued exchange rate makes exports a lot more costly to possible buyers, while imports
which constitute a sizable portion of domestic consumption turn out to be more affordable. It discourages farmers from growing crops for sale in export markets while encouraging them to produce a non-tradable crop that demands a large amount of imported fertilizer.

Recognizing that the modification of the macro-economic policy to encourage exports is complex, the federal government would need to consider adopting a more flexible exchange rate regime vis-à-vis the US dollar in addition towards the phasing away from subsidies.

Additionally to raising import prices, this step will have severe socio-economic drawbacks that require to become regarded. In addition, nationwide policies and programs concerning farm-level entry to monetary credit and training providers should be tailored to influence farmers' choices in crop manufacturing (Wichelns 2004).

When farmers can't obtain inexpensive credit score for purchasing seeds, fertilizers, and pesticides, they'll choose to produce crops that require relatively little amounts of those inputs, all else equal. Public policies that enhance the farm-level availability of credit score can encourage farmers to create tradable crops that need substantial expenditures on inputs, to produce the quality needed for sale in export markets.

Within the absence of affordable manufacturing loans, farmers will tend to select non-tradable plants that need fewer purchased inputs (Wichelns 2003). Lastly, the above mentioned actions require to be supported by serious efforts to gather applicable country-specific data, particularly, crop needs when it comes to irrigation, land, labor, and capital and the chance price of agricultural water use.