Title : ( SSP-based multi-objective crop and irrigation allocation for sustainable water management in the Gorganroud watershed, Iran )
Authors: Mahmood Sabouhi Sabouni ,Abstract
This study develops a six-objective optimization framework for crop and irrigation allocation in the Gorganroud watershed, Iran, to support agricultural water management under contrasting development priorities. The model maximizes profit and agricultural employment, minimizes carbon footprint, minimizes the blue and grey sharesof total water footprint, and maximizes the green share. Scenario-specific objective weights are derived from Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs), allowing alternative socioeconomic priorities to be translated into quantitative land- and water-allocation decisions. A profit-maximizing baseline is also solved for comparison. The optimization is subject to land availability, renewable groundwater and surface-water limits, nitrogen-loss ceilings, soil-degradation limits, crop-diversity requirements, minimum wheat production, minimum profit,and restrictions on irrigated-area expansion. Across SSP scenarios, the optimized solutions reduce carbon foot-print, grey water footprint, surface-water use, and total water use relative to the constrained profit-maximizing baseline, while increasing agricultural employment. Compared with the current system, the framework also reduces groundwater abstraction and keeps groundwater use within renewable limits, indicating a shift from structurally unsustainable exploitation toward hydrologically feasible allocation. The results show that SSP- based weighting produces systematic reallocation of crop areas and irrigation strategies, with moderate profit trade-offs but clear gains in water sustainability and environmental performance. Overall, the framework provides a policy-relevant decision-support approach for comparing crop-water allocation trade-offs in water-scarce agricultural regions, although application to other basins would require local recalibration of datasets, constraints, and policy priorities.
Keywords
, Water allocation, Cropping pattern, Water footprint, Groundwater sustainability, Scenario analysis Compromise programming@article{paperid:1107541,
author = {Sabouhi Sabouni, Mahmood},
title = {SSP-based multi-objective crop and irrigation allocation for sustainable water management in the Gorganroud watershed, Iran},
journal = {Agricultural Water Management},
year = {2026},
volume = {332},
month = {July},
issn = {0378-3774},
pages = {110511--110511},
numpages = {0},
keywords = {Water allocation; Cropping pattern; Water footprint; Groundwater sustainability; Scenario analysis
Compromise programming},
}
%0 Journal Article
%T SSP-based multi-objective crop and irrigation allocation for sustainable water management in the Gorganroud watershed, Iran
%A Sabouhi Sabouni, Mahmood
%J Agricultural Water Management
%@ 0378-3774
%D 2026
