Virtual Water And Value Added Embodied In The Exports From Various Provinces Of China Using Multiregional Input-output Model

China is a large exporter and consumer of water embodied in export products.In addition,there is much trade among regions within China,and exports from various provinces include not only local virtual water but national non-local virtual water.However,former calculations of the water consumption embodied in the exports of various provinces do not reflect the sources of the water consumption.Previous studies on virtual water in China’s exports have focused on national aggregate analyses and have paid little attention to the interregional water consumption transfer driven by exports.And predecessors failed to integrate value added and virtual water driven by export,and comprehensively discussed the environmental and economic impact of exports on China’s provinces.We used multiregional input-output model of 30 provinces to examine the virtual water export and the added value export.The results show that 1.the total virtual water in China’s exports was 109.1 billion cubic meters,and 77% of the embodiment was from exports from the eastern provinces,where over 91% of China’s exports occur,however,the opposite is true for the central and western regions,and they bear a large amount of virtual water for the export from eastern region.2.For central and western regions,the export proportion of virtual water from the national exports is45.7% of the national embodiment,thus the proportion of added value export of central and western regions is only 21.5% of the national added value export.In contrast,the eastern region obtains a large amount of added value in national exports but only exports a relatively small amount of virtual water export.3.From the case analysis of three typical export regions of Yangtze River delta,Pearl River Delta,Jing-jin-ji,the three typical export regions all net input a large number of virtual water from Xinjiang,Guangxi,Inner Mongolia,Heilongjiang,Anhui,Hunan.Therefore,thisarticle suggests promoting nationwide industrial restructuring by transferring the high water-consuming export industries from the central and western regions to the eastern region.In addition,the water-short regions should reduce the interprovincial transfer and the export of high water-consuming products.Meanwhile,we can provide appropriate funding and technical support to the water supply or water shortage regions.