Decomposition of the Urban Water Footprint of Food Consumption: A Case Study of Xiamen City

Kang, Joonho; Lin, Jianyi; Zhao, Xiaoyan; Zhao, Shengnan; Kou, Limin

doi:10.3390/su9010135

Cited by 23 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 43 publications

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“…In total, 1964 individual dietary WF estimates from 36 studies were available for inclusion in the meta-analysis to determine the WF of different dietary patterns ( Figure 4 , Supplemental Tables 7–9 ). Five studies reporting 28 estimates were excluded from the meta-analysis, because it was not possible to convert reported dietary WF estimates to liters per day per capita ( 22 , 32 , 33 , 35 , 54 ). Compared with “average” dietary patterns, “healthy” dietary patterns, “reduced ASF” dietary patterns, and “no ASF” dietary patterns had significantly lower total and green WFs ( Figure 4 ).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Water Footprint of Diets: A Global Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Harris

Moss

Joy

et al. 2020

Advances in Nutrition

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Agricultural water requirements differ between foods. Population-level dietary preferences are therefore a major determinant of agricultural water use. The “water footprint” (WF) represents the volume of water consumed in the production of food items, separated by water source; blue WF represents ground and surface water use, and green WF represents rain water use. We systematically searched for published studies using the WF to assess the water use of diets. We used the available evidence to quantify the WF of diets in different countries, and grouped diets in patterns according to study definition. “Average” patterns equated to those currently consumed, whereas “healthy” patterns included those recommended in national dietary guidelines. We searched 7 online databases and identified 41 eligible studies that reported the dietary green WF, blue WF, or total WF (green plus blue) (1964 estimates for 176 countries). The available evidence suggests that, on average, European (170 estimates) and Oceanian (18 estimates) dietary patterns have the highest green WFs (median per capita: 2999 L/d and 2924 L/d, respectively), whereas Asian dietary patterns (98 estimates) have the highest blue WFs (median: 382 L/d per capita). Foods of animal origin are major contributors to the green WFs of diets, whereas cereals, fruits, nuts, and oils are major contributors to the blue WF of diets. “Healthy” dietary patterns (425 estimates) had green WFs that were 5.9% (95% CI: −7.7, −4.0) lower than those of “average” dietary patterns, but they did not differ in their blue WFs. Our review suggests that changes toward healthier diets could reduce total water use of agriculture, but would not affect blue water use. Rapid dietary change and increasing water security concerns underscore the need for a better understanding of the amount and type of water used in food production to make informed policy decisions.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Water Footprint of Diets: A Global Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Harris

Moss

Joy

et al. 2020

Advances in Nutrition

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“…Dietary WF assessments have been conducted at global level [48,49], at national level with global coverage [50,51], continental or regional scale [45,52], individual country level [53][54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61][62][63], river basin level [64], provincial level [61], city level up to inner-city/borough level [34,[65][66][67][68][69][70][71] and for specific socioeconomic groups [65,[72][73][74]. Harris et al [33] also provide a selected overview of relevant studies.…”

Section: Geographical Coverage Data Used and Modelling Approachesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Water Resources for Sustainable Healthy Diets: State of the Art and Outlook

Vanham

2020

Water

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Sustainable healthy diets are high on the research and policy agendas. One of the crucial resources to provide such diets are water resources. This paper provides a brief overview of the current research state regarding this topic, with a focus on the water footprint concept, as latter quantifies water use along a supply chain. The water footprint (WF) quantifies blue and green water consumption, as both these water resources are essential for food and energy production as well as for the environment. Different kinds of information are embedded in a dietary WF and different data sources and modelling approaches exist, leading to WF dietary amounts that are not always directly comparable. A full sustainability assessment of a dietary WF encompasses three components: (1) an equity assessment of the total WF amount; (2) an efficiency assessment for each food item in the diet as well as (3) an impact assessment (blue water stress and green water scarcity) for each food item in the diet. The paper concludes with an outlook on future research on the topic, listing the following points: (1) future clarity in system boundary and modelling assumptions, with comparison of results between different approaches; (2) full sustainability assessments including all three components; (3) dietary footprint family assessments with the WF as one member; (4) WF assessments for multiple dietary regimes with support to the development of local dietary guidelines and (5) assessment of the synergies with LCA-based mid-point (scarcity-weighted WF) and end-point (especially human health) indicators and evaluation of the validity and empirical significance of these two indicators

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“…Even though grey water footprints have been considered for the Haihe River basin [27], limited data on grey water are published in the YREB to allow for a reliable estimate of grey water footprints. This lack of data and practice has led researchers to omit grey water footprints and focus on blue and green water footprints in their studies on water resources management in China [28][29][30]. Therefore, this paper focuses on blue and green water footprints and does not consider the grey water footprint.…”

Section: Modelsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Equitable Allocation of Blue and Green Water Footprints Based on Land-Use Types: A Case Study of the Yangtze River Economic Belt

Liu

Shi

2018

Sustainability

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This paper develops a lexicographic optimization model to allocate agricultural and non-agricultural water footprints by using the land area as the influencing factor. An index known as the water-footprint-land density (WFLD) index is then put forward to assess the impact and equity of the resulting allocation scheme. Subsequently, the proposed model is applied to a case study allocating water resources for the 11 provinces and municipalities in the Yangtze River Economic Belt (YREB). The objective is to achieve equitable spatial allocation of water resources from a water footprint perspective. Based on the statistical data in 2013, this approach starts with a proper accounting for water footprints in the 11 YREB provinces. We then determined an optimal allocation of water footprints by using the proposed lexicographic optimization approach from a land area angle. Lastly, we analyzed how different types of land uses contribute to allocation equity and we discuss policy changes to implement the optimal allocation schemes in the YREB. Analytical results show that: (1) the optimized agricultural and non-agricultural water footprints decrease from the current levels for each province across the YREB, but this decrease shows a heterogeneous pattern; (2) the WFLD of 11 YREB provinces all decline after optimization with the largest decline in Shanghai and the smallest decline in Sichuan; and (3) the impact of agricultural land on the allocation of agricultural water footprints is mainly reflected in the land use structure of three land types including arable land, forest land, and grassland. The different land use structures in the upstream, midstream, and downstream regions lead to the spatial heterogeneity of the optimized agricultural water footprints in the three YREB segments; (4) In addition to the non-agricultural land area, different regional industrial structures are the main reason for the spatial heterogeneity of the optimized non-agricultural water footprints. Our water-footprint-based optimal water resources allocation scheme helps alleviate the water resources shortage pressure and achieve coordinated and balanced development in the YREB.

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Decomposition of the Urban Water Footprint of Food Consumption: A Case Study of Xiamen City

Cited by 23 publications

References 43 publications

The Water Footprint of Diets: A Global Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

The Water Footprint of Diets: A Global Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Water Resources for Sustainable Healthy Diets: State of the Art and Outlook

Equitable Allocation of Blue and Green Water Footprints Based on Land-Use Types: A Case Study of the Yangtze River Economic Belt

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