Research on the Decoupling of Water Resources Utilization and Agricultural Economic Development in Gansu Province from the Perspective of Water Footprint

Changfeng Shi, Hang Yuan, Qinghua Pang and Yangyang Zhang
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Changfeng Shi: Business School, Hohai University, Jinling North Road NO.200, Changzhou 213022, China
Hang Yuan: Business School, Hohai University, Jinling North Road NO.200, Changzhou 213022, China
Qinghua Pang: Business School, Hohai University, Jinling North Road NO.200, Changzhou 213022, China
Yangyang Zhang: School of Economics and Management, Southeast University, Nanjing 211189, China

IJERPH, 2020, vol. 17, issue 16, 1-16

Abstract: Objectively evaluating the decoupling status of water resources utilization and economic development is an important sign of judging the sustainability of regional economic development. From the perspective of water footprint (WF), this paper expands the scope of water resources accounting by assessing agricultural blue WF, green WF and gray WF. The Tapio decoupling index was used to explore the decoupling status of agricultural WF and economic development in Gansu Province from 2006 to 2015, and the logarithmic mean divisor index (LMDI) decomposition model was used to identify the main driving factors of agricultural WF changes and explore the degree of divergence between agricultural economic development and water resources utilization. The results showed that agricultural economic growth was a main factor for the increase of WF; the improvement of agricultural production technology had a restraining effect, and the population effect and structural effect had a lesser effect. During the research period, the relationship between agricultural WF and economic growth in Gansu Province changed from weak decoupling to strong decoupling, and the contributing factors to decoupling were in descending order: economic, technological, structural and population. Finally, this paper puts forward suggestions on optimizing planting structure, improving agricultural technology and economic development mode to promote the sustainable development of local agriculture.

Keywords: water footprint; tapio decoupling; LMDI; driving factors (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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