Virtual water refers not to the physical water contained in a product, but to the water consumed throughout its production. Rainfall, surface water and groundwater used to grow an agricultural commodity become invisible once that commodity reaches the market; its price does not reflect the strategic value of the water spent to produce it. Virtual water is therefore more than an environmental accounting concept. For water-stressed countries, it is a way of reconsidering the relationship between production, trade and resource security. When a product is exported, the water itself does not cross the border, but the water consumed in producing it is no longer available for another economic or social purpose. Foreign trade in a water-scarce country cannot therefore be assessed solely through monetary returns.
Türkiye is not outside this discussion. Official figures put annual usable water availability at 1,301 cubic meters per person, placing the country among water-stressed states. Türkiye has an estimated 112 billion cubic meters of usable water potential each year, of which roughly 57 billion cubic meters is currently used; around 44 billion cubic meters goes to agricultural irrigation. Agriculture therefore accounts for about 77% of total water use. This makes the production model central to any serious water policy. Türkiye's problem is not simply that water is limited, but that a limited resource is being consumed for particular forms of production without consistently accounting for the economic return generated by that use.
The virtual-water approach makes this imbalance measurable. Research on Türkiye's major plant-based export products indicates that, for the products examined alone, roughly 5.9 billion cubic meters of virtual water enters foreign trade each year, around 1.1 billion cubic meters of which consists of blue water drawn from surface and groundwater sources. The distinction matters. Production sustained by rainfall does not impose the same resource cost as production dependent on rivers, reservoirs or aquifers in a basin already running a water deficit. Export revenue measured only in monetary terms conceals the opportunity cost of the water consumed.
A basic principle should follow: not every crop needs to be grown in every region, and not every crop that is produced needs to be exported. Supporting water-intensive production in a deficit basin simply because foreign demand exists is difficult to justify when that production generates limited economic value per unit of water. The real return on an export cannot be reduced to its market price. The type and volume of water consumed, together with the replenishment capacity of the source, must also enter the calculation. Otherwise, current export earnings may be obtained at the expense of future productive capacity.
This question is inseparable from Türkiye's irrigation regime. A significant share of agricultural irrigation still relies on surface methods. Flood irrigation, open channels and withdrawals that are not measured by volume are not sustainable in water-stressed basins. The issue is not technological modernization alone, but measurement, allocation and enforceable limits on use. Surface irrigation in deficit basins should be reduced through a defined transition timetable, while public support should increasingly be tied to pressurized and controlled systems. Metering irrigation water and managing it according to the volume used should cease to be exceptional practice.
Groundwater requires even stricter discipline. An aquifer is not a static reserve confined within a property boundary. Excessive and uncontrolled abstraction lowers water tables, affects neighboring wells and can alter groundwater-flow regimes. Where aquifers cross borders, these effects do not stop at administrative lines. Well drilling is therefore not merely a licensing matter; it is a question of resource allocation at basin scale. Groundwater use in Türkiye is already subject to a legal permit regime. The challenge is to make that regime capable of monitoring actual withdrawals and keeping them within basin water budgets. Groundwater should be treated first as a shared strategic reserve, and only then as an individual source of supply.
Inefficient use is not limited to agriculture. Data presented at the Union of Municipalities of Türkiye in February 2026 indicated that roughly one-third of the water supplied by municipalities is used in irrigation areas. The same discussion stressed the need to reconsider the use of potable network water for landscape irrigation. The issue is not only how much water cities consume, but what quality of water is assigned to each use. Using water treated to drinking-water standards for large lawns, road medians and landscaping poorly adapted to local climatic conditions is difficult to defend in a water-stressed country.
The drought-tolerant landscaping framework introduced in October 2025 under a presidential decision is therefore an important policy shift. It calls for reducing lawn areas, favoring native and drought-resistant species, expanding efficient irrigation and making greater use of alternative water sources. The next step is implementation through measurable targets and auditable performance criteria for local authorities. Water management is not only about creating new supply; it is also about preventing high-quality water from being consumed in low-priority uses.
This is where water becomes a national security issue. Unlike many security risks, water scarcity tends to produce cumulative rather than sudden effects. Pressure first appears in agricultural productivity and production costs, then moves into food prices, rural incomes and the fiscal burden of public support. Persistent deficits can accelerate rural population movements, increase the infrastructure and social-service burden on cities and intensify competition between industry and agriculture. Once energy production, food supply, urbanization and farming depend on the same constrained resource, water ceases to be a subsidiary environmental issue and becomes a strategic variable tied directly to economic resilience and state capacity.
The principal security risk is not that water will necessarily become a direct cause of conflict. More important is its ability to amplify existing economic and social vulnerabilities. Severe crises are often not produced by a single visible threat but by structural weaknesses left unmanaged for too long. Water has the potential to become such a weakness, particularly in Türkiye's wider geography. A resource pressure that appears manageable today can later translate into problems involving food supply, regional development, internal migration and public finances. Recognizing water as strategic is therefore not about militarizing the issue; it is about managing economic and administrative risks before they become harder to control.
It is significant in this respect that Türkiye's National Water Plan for 2026-2035 places water management within a national security perspective. Its basin-based approach is intended to consider the needs of agriculture, energy, settlements and ecosystems within the same water budget. The logical next step is to bring production and foreign-trade policy into that framework. Export incentives should reflect not only foreign-exchange earnings but also the water balance of the basin in which a product is grown and its blue-water footprint. Continuing to subsidize highly water-intensive crops in deficit basins would allow agricultural policy to undermine national water policy.
The regulatory direction is clear. Uncontrolled surface irrigation in water-deficit basins should be phased out; agricultural wells should be brought under registration, metering and withdrawal limits; and public support should encourage production patterns that require less water. Municipalities should reduce the share of potable network water used for landscaping, while drought-tolerant landscaping should become the standard rather than the exception. Most importantly, agricultural exports should no longer be judged only by tonnage and foreign-exchange earnings. Water consumed per unit of output, and the condition of the basin from which that water is drawn, should become part of the economic decision.
Türkiye's water challenge cannot be solved only by building more infrastructure. The country has spent decades developing substantial engineering capacity in dams, irrigation networks and drinking-water systems. The next requirement is to demonstrate the same capacity in resource allocation. For a country that is not water-rich, there is no obligation to produce every crop, export every product or preserve every existing pattern of use. Strategic resource management is not only the capacity to decide what can be done; it is also the capacity to decide what can no longer be sustained.
That is the real value of the virtual-water concept for Türkiye. It makes visible the water cost that disappears inside production and exports. Customs statistics record the economic value of a product, but not the water consumed to create that value. For a water-stressed country, that incomplete accounting is no longer sufficient. Türkiye's production and trade decisions must begin to consider the water cost alongside the market price. In some cases, what leaves the country is not merely a commodity, but part of the productive capacity that will be needed in the future.
