La huella hidrológica de la agricultura española

Abstract

The water footprint of a person, a collective or a nation is defined as the total volume of freshwater that is used to produce the goods and services consumed by the person, the collective or the inhabitants of the nation. The main objective of this study is to asses the water footprint of the Spanish agriculture. The study distinguishes betwe- en blue water consumption and green water consumption in order to reflect the relative importance of each water use for agricultural production. The results show that the Spanish water footprint is approximately 1150 m3 /cap/yr, which means 48,000 hm3 /yr. More than a half of all the volume of water used to meet the demand for goods and services consumed in Spain comes from other countries. Agriculture accounts for more than 80% of the total wa- ter footprint, being cereals and industrial crops the com- modities with the highest weight. The water footprint of Spanish agriculture has mainly increased due to the ex- pansion of the livestock sector. Even though 80% of total agricultural land in Spain is rainfed, blue water con- sumption is greater than green water consumption.