Water footprint and water resource sustainability-recent progresses

Water is a scarce strategic resource for human survival and economic development, its rational allocations and utilizations have become important to promote regional sustainable development. Impact of climate changes and human activities on spatial and temporal distribution and sustainable use of water resources is in an increasing trend. Water footprint and accounting could be effective to quantify water volume required for products and services, to measure social, economic and environmental impacts of water withdrawal, and to assess the sustainability of water resources．Major findings and achievements in the field of water footprint research are summarized here．The concept and development of water footprint were described．Methods for calculating water footprint, interactions between energy, food and water resources were discussed in the framework of food-energy-water nexus．It was emphasized that future water footprint research should focus on food-energy-water nexus．The “environmental footprint family (including water, ecology, energy, carbon, land, nitrogen, and phosphorus footprints)” indicators were summarized to evaluate comprehensive performance of human-environment coupling system, to explore the resource utilization schemes that reduce environmental footprint but meet human needs．