Assessing the Macroeconomic Impact of Water Supply Restrictions Through an Input–Output Analysis

Water supply restrictions due to droughts generate significant costs to many economic agents. Although these costs are difficult to assess, this article presents a methodology to quantify, from a general equilibrium perspective, the macroeconomic impact of water supply restrictions through the estimation of aggregate production functions that include water consumption by sectors. Simulations with an Input–output model suggest a loss of 0.34% of GDP in the case of modest restrictions on the water supply and 2.8% in the case of more extreme restrictions for 2005 for the Catalonia region in Spain. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011