IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cup/jagaec/v44y2012i02p223-234_00.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Comparing the Cost-Effectiveness of Water Conservation Policies in a Depleting Aquifer: A Dynamic Analysis of the Kansas High Plains

Author

Listed:
  • Ding, Ya
  • Peterson, Jeffrey M.

Abstract

This research analyzes two groundwater conservation policies in the Kansas High Plains located within the Ogallala aquifer: 1) cost-share assistance to increase irrigation efficiency; and 2) incentive payments to convert irrigated crop production to dryland crop production. To compare the cost-effectiveness of these two policies, a dynamic model simulated a representative irrigator's optimal technology choice, crop selection, and irrigation water use over time. The results suggest that the overall water-saving effectiveness can be improved when different policy tools are considered under different conditions. High prevailing crop prices greatly reduce irrigators' incentive to give up irrigation and therefore cause low enrollment and ineffectiveness of the incentive payment program. In areas with low aquifer-saturated thickness, the incentive payment program is more effective, whereas in areas with relatively higher water availability, the cost-share program could be a better choice.

Suggested Citation

  • Ding, Ya & Peterson, Jeffrey M., 2012. "Comparing the Cost-Effectiveness of Water Conservation Policies in a Depleting Aquifer: A Dynamic Analysis of the Kansas High Plains," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 44(2), pages 223-234, May.
  • Handle: RePEc:cup:jagaec:v:44:y:2012:i:02:p:223-234_00
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S1074070800000286/type/journal_article
    File Function: link to article abstract page
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Wheeler, Erin & Golden, Bill & Johnson, Jeffrey & Peterson, Jeffrey, 2008. "Economic Efficiency of Short-Term Versus Long-Term Water Rights Buyouts," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 40(2), pages 493-501, August.
    2. Jeffrey M. Peterson & Ya Ding, 2005. "Economic Adjustments to Groundwater Depletion in the High Plains: Do Water-Saving Irrigation Systems Save Water?," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 87(1), pages 147-159.
    3. Huffaker, Ray G. & Whittlesey, Norman K., 1995. "Agricultural Water Conservation Legislation: Will It Save Water?," Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 10(4), pages 1-5.
    4. Margriet F. Caswell & David Zilberman, 1986. "The Effects of Well Depth and Land Quality on the Choice of Irrigation Technology," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 68(4), pages 798-811.
    5. Farhed A. Shah & David Zilberman & Ujjayant Chakravorty, 1995. "Technology Adoption in the Presence of an Exhaustible Resource: The Case of Groundwater Extraction," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 77(2), pages 291-299.
    6. Michael R. Moore & Noel R. Gollehon & Marc B. Carey, 1994. "Multicrop Production Decisions in Western Irrigated Agriculture: The Role of Water Price," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 76(4), pages 859-874.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Boyer, Christopher N. & Larson, James A. & Roberts, Roland K. & McClure, Angela T. & Tyler, Donald D., 2014. "The impact of field size and energy cost on the profitability of supplemental corn irrigation," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 127(C), pages 61-69.
    2. Xu, Ying & Kovacs, Kent & Nalley, Lanier & Popp, Michael, 2015. "Investment in on-farm reservoirs to align economic returns and ecosystem services," 2015 Annual Meeting, January 31-February 3, 2015, Atlanta, Georgia 196778, Southern Agricultural Economics Association.
    3. Quintana-Ashwell, Nicolas E. & Peterson, Jeffrey M., 2014. "The Dynamic Impact of Technical Progress on Common-pool Groundwater Use and Depletion," 2015 Annual Meeting, January 31-February 3, 2015, Atlanta, Georgia 196891, Southern Agricultural Economics Association.
    4. Boyer, Christopher N. & Larson, James A. & Roberts, Roland K. & McClure, Angela T. & Tyler, Donald D. & Smith, S. Aaron, 2014. "Probability of Irrigated Corn Being Profitable in a Humid Region," 2014 Annual Meeting, February 1-4, 2014, Dallas, Texas 162470, Southern Agricultural Economics Association.
    5. Kovacs, Kent & Mattia, Mancini & Christopher, Henry & Grant, West, 2015. "Spatial irrigation management to sustain groundwater and economic returns," 2015 Annual Meeting, January 31-February 3, 2015, Atlanta, Georgia 196758, Southern Agricultural Economics Association.
    6. Andrew B. Rosenberg, 2020. "Targeting of Water Rights Retirement Programs: Evidence from Kansas," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 102(5), pages 1425-1447, October.
    7. Xu, Yuelu & Elbakidze, Levan, 2021. "Integrated assessment of N runoff in the Gulf of Mexico: an application of spatially explicit partial equilibrium and HAWQS models," 2021 Annual Meeting, August 1-3, Austin, Texas 313917, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    8. Quintana-Ashwell, Nicolas E. & Peterson, Jeffrey M., 2015. "Aquifer Depletion in the face of Climate Change and Technical Progress," 2015 AAEA & WAEA Joint Annual Meeting, July 26-28, San Francisco, California 205882, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    9. Nicolas E. Quintana Ashwell & Jeffrey M. Peterson, 2016. "The Impact of Irrigation Capital Subsidies on Common-Pool Groundwater Use and Depletion: Results for Western Kansas," Water Economics and Policy (WEP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 2(03), pages 1-22, September.
    10. Kovacs, Kent & Popp, Michael & Bryce, Kristofer & West, Grant, 2015. "On-Farm Reservoir Adoption in the Presence of Spatially Explicit Groundwater Use and Recharge," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 40(1), pages 1-27.
    11. Suarez, Federico & Fulginiti, Lilyan & Perrin, Richard, 2015. "The Value of Water in Agriculture: The U.S. High Plains Aquifer," 2015 Conference, August 9-14, 2015, Milan, Italy 211644, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    12. Boyer, Christopher N. & Adams, Damian C. & Borisova, Tatiana, 2014. "Drivers of Price and Nonprice Water Conservation by Urban and Rural Water Utilities: An Application of Predictive Models to Four Southern States," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Southern Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 46(1), pages 1-16, February.
    13. repec:ags:joaaec:163080 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Perez-Quesada, Gabriela & Hendricks, Nathan P. & Steward, David R., 2020. "Quantifying the economic costs of High Plains Aquifer depletion," 2020 Annual Meeting, July 26-28, Kansas City, Missouri 304225, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    15. Xu, Yuelu & Elbakidze, Levan & Yen, Haw & Arnold, Jeffrey G. & Gassman, Philip W. & Hubbart, Jason & Strager, Michael P., 2022. "Integrated assessment of nitrogen runoff to the Gulf of Mexico," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    16. Upendram, Sreedhar & Wibowo, Rulianda & Peterson, Jeffrey M., 2015. "Irrigation technology upgrade and water savings on the Kansas High Plains aquifer," 2015 Annual Meeting, January 31-February 3, 2015, Atlanta, Georgia 197036, Southern Agricultural Economics Association.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Xie, Yang & Zilberman, David, 2015. "Water Storage Capacities versus Water Use Efficiency: Substitutes or Complements?," 2015 AAEA & WAEA Joint Annual Meeting, July 26-28, San Francisco, California 205439, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    2. Wang, Tong & Park, Seong & Jin, Hailong, 2016. "Will Farmers Save Water? A Theoretical Analysis of Groundwater Conservation Policies for Ogallala Aquifer," 2016 Annual Meeting, February 6-9, 2016, San Antonio, Texas 229904, Southern Agricultural Economics Association.
    3. Nicolas E. Quintana Ashwell & Jeffrey M. Peterson, 2016. "The Impact of Irrigation Capital Subsidies on Common-Pool Groundwater Use and Depletion: Results for Western Kansas," Water Economics and Policy (WEP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 2(03), pages 1-22, September.
    4. Xie, Yang & Zilberman, David, 2014. "The Economics of Water Project Capacities and Conservation Technologies," 2014 Annual Meeting, July 27-29, 2014, Minneapolis, Minnesota 169820, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    5. Olen, Beau & Wu, JunJie & Langpap, Christian, 2012. "Crop-specific Irrigation Choices for Major Crops on the West Coast: Water Scarcity and Climatic Determinants," 2012 Annual Meeting, August 12-14, 2012, Seattle, Washington 124843, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    6. Susanne Scheierling & David O. Treguer & James F. Booker, 2016. "Water Productivity in Agriculture: Looking for Water in the Agricultural Productivity and Efficiency Literature," Water Economics and Policy (WEP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 2(03), pages 1-33, September.
    7. Wang, Jinxia & Zhu, Yunyun & Sun, Tianhe & Huang, Jikun & Zhang, Lijuan & Guan, Baozhu & Huang, Qiuqiong, 2020. "Forty years of irrigation development and reform in China," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 64(1), January.
    8. Kovacs, Kent & Popp, Michael & Bryce, Kristofer & West, Grant, 2015. "On-Farm Reservoir Adoption in the Presence of Spatially Explicit Groundwater Use and Recharge," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 40(1), pages 1-27.
    9. Louis Sears & Joseph Caparelli & Clouse Lee & Devon Pan & Gillian Strandberg & Linh Vuu & C. -Y. Cynthia Lin Lawell, 2018. "Jevons’ Paradox and Efficient Irrigation Technology," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(5), pages 1-12, May.
    10. Taylor, Rebecca & Zilberman, David, 2015. "The Diffusion of Process Innovation: The Case of Drip Irrigation in California," 2015 AAEA & WAEA Joint Annual Meeting, July 26-28, San Francisco, California 205320, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    11. Burness, H. Stuart & Brill, Thomas C., 2001. "The role for policy in common pool groundwater use," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(1), pages 19-40, January.
    12. Phoebe Koundouri, 2004. "Current Issues in the Economics of Groundwater Resource Management," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(5), pages 703-740, December.
    13. Lichtenberg, Erik, 2013. "Optimal Investment in Precision Irrigation Systems: A Dynamic Intraseasonal Approach," 2013 Annual Meeting, August 4-6, 2013, Washington, D.C. 149920, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    14. George Frisvold & Charles Sanchez & Noel Gollehon & Sharon B. Megdal & Paul Brown, 2018. "Evaluating Gravity-Flow Irrigation with Lessons from Yuma, Arizona, USA," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(5), pages 1-27, May.
    15. Pfeiffer, Lisa & Lin, C.-Y. Cynthia, 2014. "Does efficient irrigation technology lead to reduced groundwater extraction? Empirical evidence," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 67(2), pages 189-208.
    16. Jian Shi & JunJie Wu & Beau Olen, 2022. "Impacts of climate and weather on irrigation technology adoption and agricultural water use in the U.S. pacific northwest," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 53(3), pages 387-406, May.
    17. Huang, Qiuqiong & Wang, Jinxia & Li, Yumin, 2017. "Do water saving technologies save water? Empirical evidence from North China," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 1-16.
    18. repec:ags:jrapmc:122312 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Zilberman, David & Khanna, Madhu & Lipper, Leslie, 1997. "Economics of new technologies for sustainable agriculture," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 41(1), pages 1-18.
    20. Hellegers, Petra & Zilberman, David & van Ierland, Ekko, 2001. "Dynamics of agricultural groundwater extraction," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 37(2), pages 303-311, May.
    21. Chatterjee, Diti & Dinar, Ariel & González-Rivera, Gloria, 2019. "Impact of Agricultural Extension on Irrigated Agriculture Production and Water Use in California," Journal of the ASFMRA, American Society of Farm Managers and Rural Appraisers, vol. 2019.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • Q30 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Nonrenewable Resources and Conservation - - - General
    • Q32 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Nonrenewable Resources and Conservation - - - Exhaustible Resources and Economic Development
    • Q38 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Nonrenewable Resources and Conservation - - - Government Policy (includes OPEC Policy)

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cup:jagaec:v:44:y:2012:i:02:p:223-234_00. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Kirk Stebbing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cambridge.org/aae .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.