Recent research has shown that the extra agricultural production from irrigation across the High Plains Aquifer (HPA) was worth about $3.5 billion in 2007, $2 billion of which was produced in Nebraska. Obviously, the aquifer water is valuable. The HPAunderlies an area that includes southern South Dakota, southeastern Wyoming, eastern Colorado, Nebraska, western Kansas, eastern New Mexico, northwestern Oklahoma and northwestern Texas. This region has a semiarid climate that makes crop production highly dependent on irrigation. Given that irrigation has resulted in severe depletion in some areas of the HPA, it is important for policy purposes to identify the overall value of this resource in agricultural production.
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