Water Footprint

Water Footprint

The Water Footprint of a product is the volume of freshwater appropriated to produce the product, taking into account the volumes of water consumed and polluted in the different steps of the supply chain.
Each product produced can be given some "credits" that refer to its water footprint, mainly how much water has been used to produce it. For example, one kilogramme of beef requires around 15 thousand litres of water, and around 98% of the footprint counts for the feed of animals. Whereas one kilogramme of tomato requires 180 litres of water and around 250 liter for one kilogramme of cucumbersand potatoes.

Diet & Nutrition

As mentioned above, animal products generally have a larger water footprint than crop products. The same is true when we look at the water footprint per calorie. The average water footprint per calorie for beef is twenty times larger than for cereals and starchy roots.  I assume that this difference is one of good and valid reasons that drive people to move to the vegetarian diet.
However, this is not the case in China. Due to urbanization and improved living standards including higher incomes, the Chinese diet is rapidly and substantially transforming, particularly in regard to the consumption of animal products. The shift toward western diets also contributes to the increasing diary consumption by the Chinese population in the form of milk, yogurt, ice cream and cheese.

Actions for more agriculture, less water

Together with my group, we came up with some solutions to reduce the water footprint of crops products. Here are some of the solutions that will be explained briefly;

- Providing sensors to the corps that measure the exact amount of humidity in the soil which allows farmers to decide whether it is time to intervene and irrigate or not.

- Use of pipes with parameters that allow farmers to give only the required amount of water and avoid giving excess water.

Sources

http://livablefutureblog.com/2016/08/china-meat-and-dairy-on-the-rise

http://waterfootprint.org/media/downloads/Hoekstra-2008-WaterfootprintFood.pdf