Comparing Two Hydro-Economic Approaches for Multi-Objective Agricultural Water Resources Planning

Hydro-economic models are valuable tools that can be used in irrigated agriculture in order to improve the understanding of the status quo of water resources, the role of water in agriculture, and the system behavior under changing conditions. The present paper attempts to give insights on how different water management objectives and data availability may influence the specification/application of hydro-economic modeling, as well as the reliability and interpretation of their results. A Greek rural watershed located in Central Greece (Region of Thessaly) is used as a case study application. A common hydro-economic framework for sustainable water resources management in irrigated agriculture is examined, aiming to provide a simple and understandable tool for policymakers. In this framework two hydro-economic models (HEMs) were developed to address challenges regarding data limitations, spatial analysis, and scenario-based problems (e.g. agri-economic scenarios, water policy scenarios, environmental scenarios, etc.). A set of selection criteria was then used to qualitatively compare these two models, based on their advantages and disadvantages. The results of this analysis indicate that HEMs’ development must be quite flexible about their settings and must take into consideration the desired accuracy level that is likely to satisfy their main purpose/goal. The optimal approach is the one that can achieve a balance between simplicity, flexibility, accuracy and robustness.