Title
Water and agriculture
Date Issued
01 January 2014
Access level
metadata only access
Resource Type
book part
Author(s)
Aldaya M.M.
Zarate E.
Chico D.
Pahlow M.
Flachsbarth I.
Franco G.
Zhang G.
Garrido A.
Palhares J.C.P.
Uribe D.A.
Mekonne M.
Soriano B.
Thuy L.
Publisher(s)
Taylor and Francis
Abstract
Agriculture is essential to food security. However, food production requires substantial amounts of water, both stored in the soil as soil moisture from rain (green water) and as water for irrigation (blue water). FAO (20 12b) estimated an annual blue water use in LAC of 262, 800hm3 /yr. Globally, agriculture is the sector with the largest water withdrawal by far, with about 70%. This percentage compares to 73%, (192,700hm3 /yr) in LAC, whereas 19% and 9% correspond to the domestic and industrial sectors respectively. The Guyana sub-region (Guyana and Suriname) and Southern Cone (Argentina, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay) have the highest level of agricultural water use, with values of 96% and 91 % respectively. Agriculture is also central to economic growth in LAC. For the period 2000-2007, it contributed an average of 9.6% to its GDP and exports of agricultural commodities accounted for 44% of total export value in 2007 (Bovarnick et aI., 2010). Notably the agricultural sector provides employment for about 9% of LAC’s population (UNEP, 2013).
Start page
177
End page
212
Language
English
OCDE Knowledge area
Agricultura
Scopus EID
2-s2.0-85057344336
ISBN
9780415713689
Resource of which it is part
Water for Food Security and Well-being in Latin America and the Caribbean: Social and Environmental Implications for a Globalized Economy
ISBN of the container
978-113468280-5
Sources of information: Directorio de Producción Científica Scopus