Peña-Guerrero et al. (2026) Climate change has increased crop water consumption in Central Asia despite less water-intensive cropping

Identification

• Journal: Communications Earth & Environment
• Year: 2026
• Date: 2026-01-08
• Authors: Mayra Daniela Peña-Guerrero, G. B. Senay, Atabek Umirbekov, Larisa Tarasova, Philippe Rufin, Bakhtiyor Pulatov, Daniel Müller
• DOI: 10.1038/s43247-025-03142-y

Research Groups

• Department of Catchment Hydrology, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research-UFZ, Halle (Saale), Germany
• Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition Economies (IAMO), Halle (Saale), Germany
• Geography Department, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Berlin, Germany
• Tashkent Institute of Irrigation and Agricultural Mechanization Engineers (TIIAME), National Research University, Tashkent, Uzbekistan
• U.S. Geological Survey Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center, North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center, Fort Collins, CO, USA
• Earth and Life Institute, UCLouvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium
• Research Institute of Environment and Nature Conservation Technologies, Tashkent, Uzbekistan
• Integrative Research Institute on Transformations of Human-Environment System (IRI THESys), Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Berlin, Germany

Short Summary

This study quantified the dynamics and drivers of crop water consumption in the Amu Darya Basin from 1987 to 2019, revealing a 10% increase in total consumption and an 18% increase per unit area, primarily driven by climate change despite a regional shift towards less water-intensive crops.

Objective

• To estimate the dynamics of crop water consumption by mapping annual actual evapotranspiration and to disentangle the contributions of land use and climate changes to these dynamics in the irrigated croplands of the Amu Darya Basin.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: Amu Darya Basin, covering 535,000 km², focusing on all irrigated croplands across Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.
• Temporal Scale: 1987 to 2019 (33 years), with annual actual evapotranspiration estimates for the growing season (April through October).

Methodology and Data

• Models used: Operational Simplified Surface Energy Balance model (SSEBop) with Forcing and Normalizing Operation (FANO) algorithm, decomposition analysis.
• Data sources:
  • Landsat imagery (Collection 2 Tier 1 surface reflectance products) for land surface temperature (LST) and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI).
  • Climate Hazard Group InfraRed Precipitation with Station Data (CHIRPS version 2) for daily precipitation (0.05° spatial resolution).
  • ERA5-Land reanalysis for daily maximum air temperature (0.1° spatial resolution) and net radiation.
  • Potential Evapotranspiration (PET) dataset (0.1° spatial resolution) calculated via FAO’s Penman-Monteith method.
  • Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) for Digital Elevation Model (DEM, 30 m spatial resolution).
  • Landsat-based cropland maps (30 m spatial resolution) for the Amu Darya Basin.
  • Meteorological station data from local research and governmental institutions in Uzbekistan for model validation.

Main Results

• Total crop water consumption in the Amu Darya Basin increased by 10% from 1987 to 2019.
• Average crop water consumption per unit area increased by 18% over the study period.
• Climate change was the dominant driver, contributing to a potential 21% increase in crop water consumption.
• Land use changes towards less water-intensive cropping practices offset only 3% of the climate-driven increase.
• Double cropping exhibited the highest average water consumption (511 mm/year), followed by dry season cropping (415 mm/year) and wet season cropping (370 mm/year).
• Dry season cropping consumed the largest total volume of water (7.8 km³ in 2019).
• Atmospheric water demand (reference ET) and maximum air temperatures showed consistent increases across all regions (e.g., 0.04–0.06 °C/year for maximum temperature).
• Downstream regions experienced the highest increase in actual evapotranspiration (21%) and greater annual ETa anomalies, with land use changes providing no compensation for rising water demand.
• Midstream regions showed the most substantial compensatory effects from land use changes (5% offset) due to a pronounced shift away from water-intensive cultivation.

Contributions

• Provides a long-term (1987-2019), high-resolution (30 m spatial resolution) analysis of crop water consumption dynamics across the entire Amu Darya Basin, a critical dryland region.
• Quantifies and disentangles the relative contributions of climate change and land use change to observed changes in crop water consumption, addressing a previously underexplored area.
• Highlights that current land use adaptation strategies alone are insufficient to curb increasing water scarcity in Central Asia amidst accelerating climate change, emphasizing the necessity of global emission reduction commitments.
• Offers spatially detailed insights into regional variations in crop water use and the effectiveness of land use changes, informing targeted water management and agricultural decision-making.

Funding

• Volkswagen Foundation through the Sustainable Agricultural Development in Central Asia (SUSADICA) project (Grant No. 96264).
• Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL.

Citation

@article{PeñaGuerrero2026Climate,
  author = {Peña-Guerrero, Mayra Daniela and Senay, G. B. and Umirbekov, Atabek and Tarasova, Larisa and Rufin, Philippe and Pulatov, Bakhtiyor and Müller, Daniel},
  title = {Climate change has increased crop water consumption in Central Asia despite less water-intensive cropping},
  journal = {Communications Earth & Environment},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.1038/s43247-025-03142-y},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-025-03142-y}
}