JustWATER · - Water Decision Making tools for informed hydro politics in Italy

JustWATER -- Water Decision Making tools for informed hydro politics in Italy

CONTEXT Striking a balance between water supply and water demand is one of the greatest human challenges at the global level. In the last three decades, the intensification of surface and groundwater use has led to alarming levels of water depletion in major aquifers, threatening the survival of natural ecosystems around the world rivers.Intensified water use has been mainly caused by the increase in agricultural irrigation. To quantify the water used to produce agricultural crops, a new concept was created: virtual water. Virtual water is the water embodied in commodities – agricultural and beyond – and represents all the water needed during the production process of commodities. At the national level, agricultural imports embed virtual water imports and allow a nation to save national water resources while using up the water of the exporter country. Not all water is the same and not all virtual water is the same: some water is more vulnerable than others. Some water sources are renewable, while others are non-renewable. Some irrigation areas suffer localised water scarcity, pollution, over-pumping and other issues. Consequently, some virtual water flows are sustainable, while others are not. Their socio-economic impacts on the local communities of the exporting countries can vary greatly, especially where the production is mainly export-led, labour-intensive and subject to contract farming. JustWater focuses on water-scarce areas and areas where groundwater is being depleted, because it is based on the data ( published in Nature in 2017 by Dalin et al.) that export-led irrigated agriculture relies on vulnerable groundwater in Italy. At the global level, Italy is the fifth net virtual water importer while also being the ninth largest virtual water exporter of depleted groundwater. In the European Union, Italy is the largest exporter of virtual water sourced from depleted groundwater6. This information, published in 2017 by Carol Dalin et. al. in Nature, has been largely ignored by the Italian literature on virtual water. JustWater takes Italy as a case-study to address this gap, given thathe case is highly relevant at the European level and pertinent with the EU New Growth Strategy, reinforcing the EU Green Deal’s communication, in line with the EU Water Framework Directive. Finally,pertinence with UN SDG 5 on gender equality and with SDG on water is strong. The project is particularly timing: the sustainable use of water resources in European Mediterranean countries is currently challenged by climate change. Water extremes - droughts and floods - have already been occurring as a direct result of the increase in temperatures in the Mediterranean area, particularly in “climatic hot spots” as defined by the IPCC reports and discussed at the UN COP26. In Italy, an IPCC hot spot, the summer of 2022 has marked one of the most severe droughts of the last 20 years. Italian literature on virtual water and water footprint has focused on the global and national levels, providing aggregated data by country and per major globally traded crops or data on aggregated by crop production.This literature has fallen short of connecting virtual water exports to the exact geographical location beyond the national level, thus neglecting the substantial differences that exist at the regional and sub-regional levels and in particular the existence of hotspots where vulnerable groundwater and water-scarce areas are involved. JustWater aims to clarify where depleted groundwater and surface water is involved in the Italian irrigation. By delivering GIS maps, graphic charts , the project allows a further socio-economic analysis of export-led crops. JustWater can help visualise where depleted groundwater and water-scarce areas suffer from the highest levels of water withdrawals. The publication of export-quantities by region in the future is further needed to quantify export-flows from each territory. Currently ISTAT, the Italian Institute of Statistics, provides this information only under the form of economic value in Euros and by aggregated crops ( cerals, fruits), thus impeding the final quantification of single-crop, envisaged in the grand vision of the virtual water geo-spatial analysis. Having considered the limitation of the ISTAT dataset, the main objectives of the projects were: 1. building up regional and sub-regional specific GIS maps for the geo-location of a selection of agri-food production in Italy, irrigated with depleted groundwater and located in water-scarce areas 2. delivering a country-specific graphic chart: the project produced more than 600 graphic maps and charts related to irrigated crops of Italy 3. providing decision making tools for the formulation of socio-economic analysis of virtual water derived by the regional maps and charts ( more than 600) , to enable policy-orientated framework for a national strategy 4. exposing the Italian water community to the project results 5. exposing the Italian water community to its gender roles dynamics through a literatue review and a methodology based on the UNESCO sex-disaggregated indicators for water monitoring, assessment and reporting 6. expanding the professional skills of the researcher in the field of large dataset management and science production in the field of virtual water analysis, producing a bilateral transfer of knowledge with the University of Bergamo, and increasing her career opportunities and employability after a maternity career break. This was fully achieved, as the employability of the researcher was reached the month after the end of the project. 7. Innovating the discipline of virtual water by connecting the hard science of econometrics and physical geography: the researcher had the occasion to present novel theoretical discussion in international and national academic events where the geospatial turn of virtual water was presented as a way to connect the political ecology of water with critical hydropolitics theories (in particular, hydro-social theories with hydro-hegemony theories). The project produced outputs for reconnecting geo-spatial research with critical hydropolitics, political economy and political ecology (currently in publication procedures under the review process of the peer-reviewed journal “World Development”). JustWater elaborated a novel framework and methodology for the promotion of water sustainability in the agri-food sectors, especially in drought-prone countries. Its three-pronged approach is based on the integration of GIS maps with destination charts and a socio-economic analysis and is replicable in other drought-prone countries. While other drought-prone countries – such as Egypt, Spain, California and Israel – have already included a virtual water strategy in their national water plans to save on their national water resources, Italy has not yet done so. JustWater provided tools towards this goal. Its outcomes were foreseen to be of easy replicability to guide other drought-prone countries in the EU, such as Cyprus, Portugal and Greece. As a matter of fact in month 1 after the project conclusion, the JustWATER method is already being used by the researcher in her analysis of Morocco and Egypt in an EU-funded project under the PRIMA Foundation, called STAPLES.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union