Water security, risk, and economic growth: Insights from a dynamical systems model
Water security, risk, and economic growth: Insights from a dynamical systems model
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DOI：
10.1002/2017wr020640
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发表时间：
2017-08
影响因子：
5.4
通讯作者：
S. Dadson;J. Hall;D. Garrick;C. Sadoff;D. Grey;D. Whittington
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
S. Dadson;J. Hall;D. Garrick;C. Sadoff;D. Grey;D. Whittington
在大多数文明的发展中，对水资源管理所需的有形基础设施、人力资本和机构的投资是值得注意的。这些投资以两种不同的方式影响经济：（i）通过提高多个经济部门的水要素生产率，特别是农业和能源等水密集型部门;（ii）通过减少洪水，干旱和与水有关的疾病等与水有关的灾害的急性和慢性有害影响。人们普遍认为需要资本投资来减轻风险和促进经济增长，但以前关于水相关投资与经济增长之间关系的概念性工作主要集中在水在经济中的生产性和有害作用上。在这里，这两种影响是结合使用一个简单的，与水有关的投资，风险和增长的动态系统模型。在初始水安全性较低的情况下，对水相关资产的初始投资可以实现增长。如果没有这种投资，与水有关的灾害造成的损失会拖累经济增长，并可能造成贫困陷阱。贫困陷阱的存在和位置因具体情况而异，取决于与水有关的生产性资产面临的水相关风险。水相关风险的外生变化可能会使经济偏离增长道路，陷入贫困陷阱。我们的调查表明，水安全投资水平与当前水安全水平之间的倒U型投资关系导致了比我们在这里考虑的替代方案更快的增长率，并且这种关系是文献中假设的“S”曲线的原因。这些结果说明了在经济模型中考虑环境和健康风险的重要性，并为设计稳健的水相关生产性资产投资政策以管理风险提供了见解，面对环境变化。
Investments in the physical infrastructure, human capital, and institutions needed for water resources management have been noteworthy in the development of most civilizations. These investments affect the economy in two distinct ways: (i) by improving the factor productivity of water in multiple economic sectors, especially those that are water intensive such as agriculture and energy and (ii) by reducing acute and chronic harmful effects of water‐related hazards like floods, droughts, and water‐related diseases. The need for capital investment to mitigate risks and promote economic growth is widely acknowledged, but prior conceptual work on the relationship between water‐related investments and economic growth has focused on the productive and harmful roles of water in the economy independently. Here the two influences are combined using a simple, dynamical systems model of water‐related investment, risk, and growth. In cases where initial water security is low, initial investment in water‐related assets enables growth. Without such investment, losses due to water‐related hazards exert a drag on economic growth and may create a poverty trap. The presence and location of the poverty trap is context‐specific and depends on the exposure of productive water‐related assets to water‐related risk. Exogenous changes in water‐related risk can potentially push an economy away from a growth path toward a poverty trap. Our investigation shows that an inverted‐U‐shaped investment relation between the level of investment in water security and the current level of water security leads to faster rates of growth than the alternatives that we consider here, and that this relation is responsible for the “S”‐curve that is posited in the literature. These results illustrate the importance of accounting for environmental and health risks in economic models and offer insights for the design of robust policies for investment in water‐related productive assets to manage risk, in the face of environmental change.