Water, Climate, Food
Sufficient water of good quality is crucial for people and the environment. Over the past decades water demand for human water uses more than tripled driven by population growth, socio-economic development, expansion of irrigated area, and climate change. Negative impacts of the overuse of water are already experienced for many regions of the world. Given the projected climate change, population growth, and socio-economic developments worldwide the pressure on our freshwater resources will continue to increase.
In the Water, Climate, Food subgroup we aim to better quantify the current and future availability of our freshwater resources and how much we can use in a sustainable way. We specifically focus on studying the impacts and trade-offs between water used for food, energy, and needed to maintain a healthy environment. In addition, we quantify the current and future dependency of crop production on sufficient water and how water scarcity or flooding will impact crop production and food security. Finally, we evaluate potential adaptation pathways to ‘bend the trend’ towards a more water and food secure world.
We use novel and unique numerical models at scales from global to regional. A specific aim of the regional-scale modelling is to ensure that scientific knowledge truly meets the needs in generating sustainable solutions and to make sure that management interventions will not have unwanted side-effects. Regions where our regional scale research is focussed on are, for example, Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh.
