Tracing water use by sectors in Morocco: An input–output modeling approach

Abstract

AbstractIn recent decades, Morocco has experienced a strong and rapid increase in water demand due to many challenges such as population growth, urbanization sprawl, and economic development. Besides, climate change and its negative impact on natural water resources availability have put the supply–demand balance in jeopardy. This imperative has created a priority need to analyze the demand structure and identify how economic sector linkages mitigate or exacerbate water shortage. In this paper, a methodological framework based on an input–output model has been proposed to capture not only sectors with a large drag effect on water consumption of the whole economy but also the propagation of water use from both diffusion and absorption effects. The results show that the responsibility for water stress is attributed to different sectors and depends on the exogenous final demand shocks. This highlights the significance of consumers' decisions in the determination of ecological impact assessment.