Abstract
The aim of this work is to evaluate the sustainability of water management for agriculture in a specific territory through the creation of a synthetic index resulting from the aggregation of multiple indices (environmental, economic, and social). The resulting synthetic index can be used to set sustainability standards and to guide the choices mandated by the Common Agricultural Policy 2023–2027. In this work we intend to show how the Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) method facilitates a complex process such as establishing a degree of sustainability in a certain area and, therefore, provides support to national or regional policies and communities. The integration of MCDA and GIS increases the efficiency of the support activity. A case study is presented evaluating the level of sustainability in the Irrigation and Reclamation Consortium of Piacenza and Emilia Centrale, in the Emilia Romagna region.
Highlights
Sustainability 2021, 13, 8221. https://In recent decades the agricultural sector has faced important challenges, such as increasingly extended periods of drought, off-season extreme cold events, and difficulties in responding effectively to the global need for food because of climate change and the continuing population growth
The results showed the sustainability performances of the territories through the scores obtained with respect to the individual indicators, classified as environmental, social, and economic
The work presented made it possible to compare the sustainability practices of the reclamation consortia. The choice of this area allowed us to effectively guide the policies, as the current trend is to reward the work of the consortia and certify it through the creation of sustainability marks aimed at the consortia themselves
Summary
Sustainability 2021, 13, 8221. https://In recent decades the agricultural sector has faced important challenges, such as increasingly extended periods of drought, off-season extreme cold events, and difficulties in responding effectively to the global need for food because of climate change and the continuing population growth. The CAP is, increasingly oriented toward the protection of environmental resources, while maintaining the general objective of supporting farmers’ incomes and keeping workers in rural and agricultural areas. This is in line with the principles of sustainable development, which require an integrated approach to the environmental, social, and economic aspects [3]. Deshpande et al (2020) [7] assessed the environmental, economic, and social impacts of landfilling, incinerating, and recycling of waste fishing gears in Norway, using MCDA to rank the end-of-life (EOL) alternatives through their ability to sustainably manage the waste plastics from fishing gears in Norway. Boggia and Cortina [12] ranked
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