TY - JOUR
T1 - Sustainability of agricultural basin development under uncertain future climate and economic conditions
T2 - A socio-hydrological analysis
AU - Roobavannan, M.
AU - Kandasamy, J.
AU - Pande, S.
AU - Vigneswaran, S.
AU - Sivapalan, M.
N1 - This paper falls within the framework of the Panta-Rhei Research Initiative of the International Association of Hydrological Sciences (IAHS). We would like to acknowledge the US National Science Foundation's Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center (SESYNC; NSF award DBI-1052875) for their support of the project “Toward Socio-hydrologic Synthesis: Modeling the Co-evolutionary Dynamics of Coupled Human, Water, and Ecological System”. M. Roobavannan acknowledges the funding provided by Post-Thesis Publication Award from UTS. Model data used in this study could be accessed in https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.7704851.
The Pareto frontier analysis shows that high capital growth and diversifying the economy by investment in other non-agricultural economic sectors is perhaps the only prudent pathway forward toward a sustainable future despite the vagaries of climate but this will come at some cost to the environment. In the case of drought (lower inflow) the ecosystem might suffer but is likely to survive as environmental water will still be delivered, albeit in smaller amounts. Under favorable climatic conditions (higher inflow) agriculture does expand but in a measured manner commensurate with ecosystem requirements. In this setting, when the economy is diversified, water is wisely managed, and the basin will be on a sustainable development path. The very severe drought that occurred in September 2018 in the MRB provides a glimpse into this new setting. Politicians representing rural constituencies and coalition partners of the Australian Federal Government acting out of political opportunism proposed diverting environment water to agriculture, saying that everything should be done to help farmers. Surprisingly though this idea was not supported by the National Irrigators Council, preferring instead to continue the previously legislated water allocations. Its Chief Executive Officer said “If water can arbitrarily be taken from the environment now in adverse times, then in the future it may be taken from us when conditions suit.” ( ABC, 2018 ; Weekly Times, 2018 ). Meanwhile financial aid and mental health and social support to affected farmer rightly continues.
This paper falls within the framework of the Panta-Rhei Research Initiative of the International Association of Hydrological Sciences (IAHS). We would like to acknowledge the US National Science Foundation 's Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center (SESYNC; NSF award DBI-1052875 ) for their support of the project “Toward Socio-hydrologic Synthesis: Modeling the Co-evolutionary Dynamics of Coupled Human, Water, and Ecological System”. M. Roobavannan acknowledges the funding provided by Post-Thesis Publication Award from UTS . Model data used in this study could be accessed in https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.7704851 .
PY - 2020/8
Y1 - 2020/8
N2 - A socio-hydrological model is used to forecast future conditions in a river basin arising from changes in climate and the economy in order to learn about macroeconomic conditions that would yield pathways for sustainable development and how they may be affected by changes in climate and the economy. The study uses a system dynamics model with endogenous social values and preferences and exogenous climate and economic drivers. Basin scale sustainability is defined as a function of economic growth, provision of environmental services and equality within the basin. The analysis reveals that a diversified basin economy is important to achieve sustainable development. Under current climate conditions, a higher level of diversification in the basin's economy increases sustainability. Higher current capital growth rates, e.g., >2% of the current rate, would also lead to more sustainable development of a kind that is less affected by the availability of water and robust to vagaries of climate change. The results suggest that policy-makers and resource managers should focus on measures to diversify the economy when it is thriving, but also consider the capacity of society to adapt to unpredictable shocks to the system.
AB - A socio-hydrological model is used to forecast future conditions in a river basin arising from changes in climate and the economy in order to learn about macroeconomic conditions that would yield pathways for sustainable development and how they may be affected by changes in climate and the economy. The study uses a system dynamics model with endogenous social values and preferences and exogenous climate and economic drivers. Basin scale sustainability is defined as a function of economic growth, provision of environmental services and equality within the basin. The analysis reveals that a diversified basin economy is important to achieve sustainable development. Under current climate conditions, a higher level of diversification in the basin's economy increases sustainability. Higher current capital growth rates, e.g., >2% of the current rate, would also lead to more sustainable development of a kind that is less affected by the availability of water and robust to vagaries of climate change. The results suggest that policy-makers and resource managers should focus on measures to diversify the economy when it is thriving, but also consider the capacity of society to adapt to unpredictable shocks to the system.
KW - Future projections
KW - Safe operating space
KW - Socio-hydrology
KW - Sustainable development
KW - Values and preferences
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U2 - 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2020.106665
DO - 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2020.106665
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85084196843
SN - 0921-8009
VL - 174
JO - Ecological Economics
JF - Ecological Economics
M1 - 106665
ER -