Title: Water distribution to contain soil degradation: sustainability and equity implications

Authors: John Janmaat

Addresses: Queen's University at Kingston, Canada

Abstract: Externalities associated with irrigation, such as soil salinization, are causing losses in agricultural productivity around the world. Often water authorities can neither price water on a volumetric basis nor deliver exact volumes of water to individual users. Using a dynamic model of farmers in an environment where salinity problems can occur, a set of feasible water allocation policies is evaluated. On the basis of sustainable returns, short and long term equity, no policy is a clear winner. Often, policies which rank high for short term equity perform poorly on both sustainable returns and long term equity.

Keywords: water distribution; soil degradation: sustainability; equity; sustainable development; irrigation; agricultural productivity; agriculture; dynamic modelling; farmers; salinity; water allocation.

DOI: 10.1504/IER.2000.054004

Interdisciplinary Environmental Review, 2000 Vol.2 No.2, pp.247 - 279

Published online: 13 May 2013 *

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