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| Titel |
Simulating potential water grabbing from large-scale land acquisitions in Africa} |
| VerfasserIn |
Emma Li Johansson, Marianela Fader, Jonathan W. Seaquist, Kimberly A. Nicholas |
| Konferenz |
EGU General Assembly 2017
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| Medientyp |
Artikel
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| Sprache |
en
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| Digitales Dokument |
PDF |
| Erschienen |
In: GRA - Volume 19 (2017) |
| Datensatznummer |
250145351
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| Publikation (Nr.) |
 EGU/EGU2017-9285.pdf |
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| Zusammenfassung |
| The potential high level of water appropriation in Africa by foreign companies
might pose high socioenvironmental challenges, including overconsumption
of water and conflicts and tensions over water resources allocation. We will
present a study published recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences11
of the USA, where we simulated green and blue water demand and crop yields of large-scale
land acquisitions in several African countries. Green water refers to precipitation stored in
soils and consumed by plants through evapotranspiration, while blue water is extracted from
rivers, lakes, aquifers, and dams. We simulated seven irrigation scenarios, and compared
these data with two baseline scenarios of staple crops representing previous water demand.
The results indicate that the green and blue water use is 39% and 76-86% greater,
respectively, for crops grown on acquired land compared with the baseline of common staple
crops, showing that land acquisitions substantially increase water demands. We also found
that most land acquisitions are planted with crops such as sugarcane, jatropha, and
eucalyptus, that demand volumes of water >9,000 m3⋅ha−1. And even if the most
efficient irrigation systems were implemented, 18% of the land acquisitions, totaling
91,000 ha, would still require more than 50% of water from blue water sources. |
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