Irrigation water demand and elasticities: a case study of the High Plains aquifer

• DOI: 10.1007/s00271-022-00804-z
• Publication Date: 2022-07-09T11:02:48Z
• Authors: Santosh Pathak; Naveen C. Adusumilli; Hua Wang; Lal K. Almas
• Keywords: Irrigation statistics; Water use; Inverse demand function; Water pricing

Abstract The agriculture of the Texas High Plains (THP) region is primarily dependent on groundwater irrigation. Changing weather patterns along with competing demands for water resources and other anthropogenic effects have dramatically increased withdrawals from Ogallala aquifer. In addition to on-farm changes, policy tools based off-farm mechanisms are equally indispensable in addressing sustainable use THP. One such tool pricing using estimates price elasticity irrigation demand. This paper demand THP assesses influence major inputs used dominant irrigated crops as corn cotton. Using translog profit function an annual county-level dataset crop production, spanning 23 years (1998–2020), we find that elastic cotton ( η = – 1.58) but inelastic 0.81). Our findings suggest a non-uniform could be useful promote efficient