Consequences of drought regimes on the water footprint of agricultural production. Temporal analysis of the Guadalupe Valley, Mexico.

Abstract

Abstract Changes in water availability have a strong impact on the sustainability and maintenance of agriculture, with water footprint (WF) being a robust methodology to assess these transformations. The Guadalupe Valley is one of the places with the highest agricultural production in Mexico. Despite its semi-arid climatic conditions, it provides high-quality crops that are well-positioned in the world. The historical trend of rainfall and temperatures between 1987-2017 was analyzed with the purpose of identifying climatic patterns in the territory. Through the calculations of the water footprint of Grapevine and Olive crops, the sensitivity of the crops to recurrent water deficit and their adaptation in their yields to drought episodes was identified. The decrease in rainfall and extreme temperatures led to an increase in crop evapotranspiration and crop irrigation requirements. As a result, there has been a clear increase in the consumption of WFagricultural since 2007. Thus, the period of highest WFagricultural consumption was 2014 (Extremely dry), as opposed to 2011 (Very wet). In particular, the lowest WFgreen consumptions were observed in extremely dry years, that is, >20% of the WFagricultural intensifying drought events. Therefore, these periods were compensated with higher uses of WFblue and WFgray, which are inversely correlated with precipitation, where vine crops consume 73% more WFagricultural compared to olive plantations, showing greater interannual variability. These results contribute to crop diversification, land use planning, water consumption efficiency, and drought risk reduction.