TY - JOUR
T1 - The aesthetics of water and land
T2 - A promising concept for managing scarce water resources under climate change
AU - Tielbörger, Katja
AU - Fleischer, Aliza
AU - Menzel, Lucas
AU - Metz, Johannes
AU - Sternberg, Marcelo
PY - 2010/11/28
Y1 - 2010/11/28
N2 - The eastern Mediterranean faces a severe water crisis: water supply decreases due to climate change, while demand increases due to rapid population growth. The GLOWA Jordan River project generates science-based management strategies for maximizing water productivity under global climate change. We use a novel definition of water productivity as the full range of services provided by landscapes per unit blue (surface) and green (in plants and soil) water. Our combined results from climatological, ecological, economic and hydrological studies suggest that, in Israel, certain landscapes provide high returns as ecosystem services for little input of additional blue water. Specifically, cultural services such as recreation may by far exceed that of food production. Interestingly, some highly valued landscapes (e.g. rangeland) appear resistant to climate change, making them an ideal candidate for adaptive land management. Vice versa, expanding irrigated agriculture is unlikely to be sustainable under global climate change. We advocate the inclusion of a large range of ecosystem services into integrated land and water resources management. The focus on cultural services and integration of irrigation demand will lead to entirely different but productive water and land allocation schemes that may be suitable for withstanding the problems caused by climate change.
AB - The eastern Mediterranean faces a severe water crisis: water supply decreases due to climate change, while demand increases due to rapid population growth. The GLOWA Jordan River project generates science-based management strategies for maximizing water productivity under global climate change. We use a novel definition of water productivity as the full range of services provided by landscapes per unit blue (surface) and green (in plants and soil) water. Our combined results from climatological, ecological, economic and hydrological studies suggest that, in Israel, certain landscapes provide high returns as ecosystem services for little input of additional blue water. Specifically, cultural services such as recreation may by far exceed that of food production. Interestingly, some highly valued landscapes (e.g. rangeland) appear resistant to climate change, making them an ideal candidate for adaptive land management. Vice versa, expanding irrigated agriculture is unlikely to be sustainable under global climate change. We advocate the inclusion of a large range of ecosystem services into integrated land and water resources management. The focus on cultural services and integration of irrigation demand will lead to entirely different but productive water and land allocation schemes that may be suitable for withstanding the problems caused by climate change.
KW - Blue-green water approach
KW - Ecosystem services
KW - Global change
KW - Integrated land and water resources management
KW - Middle East
KW - Water productivity
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=78649368333&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1098/rsta.2010.0143
DO - 10.1098/rsta.2010.0143
M3 - Article
C2 - 20956374
AN - SCOPUS:78649368333
SN - 1364-503X
VL - 368
SP - 5323
EP - 5337
JO - Philosophical transactions. Series A, Mathematical, physical, and engineering sciences
JF - Philosophical transactions. Series A, Mathematical, physical, and engineering sciences
IS - 1931
ER -