Virtual water strategy and its application in optimal operation of water resources

The water used in the production process of an agricultural or industrial product is called "virtual water". In Iran with low average annual precipitation also lack of available water resources, concept of the virtual water and its trade is used as a strategy for optimal operation of water resources in many fields such as water scarcity, drought and so on. This concept, also, could hold some interesting new opportunities for the field of sustainable consumption. Recently, in Iran, net virtual water import reached to (15-20)*109 m3 per year and is one out of the top ten virtual importing countries. In this research, after virtual water applicable concepts expressing, virtual water content in some of the agricultural products in the world have been compared with products existence in Iran. Additionally, we selected some strategic agricultural products, which export and import to the country, and used an algorithm called "Genetic Algorithm", to optimize virtual water usage and trade according to demands, agricultural situation, production cost and environmental condition. Results showed which products how could help optimal water resources operation and effect of virtual water usage in economic growth.