Uzbekistan, being historically one of the most populated and agriculture-based republics in the former Soviet Union, still features quite high annual population growth rates and great dependence on agriculture as a backbone for the rest of the economic reforms.With water playing an extremely important role in producing a sufficient food base for the country's growing population and earning much needed foreign exchange for the government to ensure overall economic development, the pressures on this scarce resource will obviously and inevitably grow, putting it much at risk over a long-term perspective. So would available water be enough to meet ever-increasing demands from major economic uses in the foreseeable future, and what can be the options for meeting such demands - these are the key questions raised and researched in this article. As such the research concentrates on the two major country-specific scenarios with water and its multiple uses for Uzbekistan - the business as usual and the best case. Both scenarios discuss possible future implications for the next quarter-century given certain assumptions. Finally when summarizing the findings, the paper provides conclusions and recommendations as to how the model and further scenarios can be better optimized given the trans-boundary nature of most water resources in Central Asia where Uzbekistan geographically belongs.

Uzbekistan, being historically one of the most populated and agriculture-based republics in the former Soviet Union, still features quite high annual population growth rates and great dependence on agriculture as a backbone for the rest of the economic reforms.With water playing an extremely important role in producing a sufficient food base for the country's growing population and earning much needed foreign exchange for the government to ensure overall economic development, the pressures on this scarce resource will obviously and inevitably grow, putting it much at risk over a long-term perspective. So would available water be enough to meet ever-increasing demands from major economic uses in the foreseeable future, and what can be the options for meeting such demands - these are the key questions raised and researched in this article. As such the research concentrates on the two major country-specific scenarios with water and its multiple uses for Uzbekistan - the business as usual and the best case. Both scenarios discuss possible future implications for the next quarter-century given certain assumptions. Finally when summarizing the findings, the paper provides conclusions and recommendations as to how the model and further scenarios can be better optimized given the trans-boundary nature of most water resources in Central Asia where Uzbekistan geographically belongs.

In CGIAR Challenge Program on Water and Food. Challenge Program on Water and Food: background papers to the full proposal. Colombo, Sri Lanka: CGIAR Challenge Program on Water and Food.

In the Middle East and North Africa, food security and water security are tightly entwined. In particular, choices about the extent to which food security policies rely on trade rather than domestically produced staples have stark consequences for the region's limited water resources. This paper builds on previous modeling results comparing the cost and benefits of policies to protect consumers against surging international wheat prices, and expands the analysis to consider the consequences of the policies for water resources. A self-sufficiency policy is analyzed as well. Results suggest that trade-based food security policies have no significant effect on the sustainability of water resources, while the costs of policies based on self-sufficiency for water resources are high. The analysis also shows that while information about the water footprint of alternative production systems is helpful, a corresponding economic footprint that fully measures the resource cost of water is needed to concisely rank alternative policies in economic terms that are consistent with sustainable outcomes.