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Sustainability of the Mississippi River Valley Alluvial Aquifer (MRVAA) is a growing concern for regulators and farmers alike. Currently, non-binding and unmonitored regulatory policies have not decelerated the rapid depletion of the MRVAA. As such, the State of Mississippi is facing significant challenges in developing, if necessary, future regulations to maintain water sustainability. The primary goal of this study is to investigate the potential impacts on voluntary water use restrictions and welfare resulting from credible and binding future use-limit regulations. To maintain relevance to MRVAA, we develop a novel commons extraction game accounting for heterogeneously endowed producers in regards to recharge rates and the potential for localized complete depletion. Credibility in the game is established once the majority of producers have ran out of water and are assumed to support regulation. Predictions of the game without regulation, under various strategic assumptions, are subsequently tested in laboratory experiments across various regulatory treatment policies. Treatment policies include: no regulation, limited-use, and moratorium. Preliminary results indicate, that without the extreme credible threat of moratorium, users do not significantly volunteer to reduce extraction rates. Planned replication of experiments should provide robust insights into future water levels if regulation or volunteering is not instituted.

Heterogeneous forage utilization by free ranging livestock in Senegal have been observed. This research addresses the changes in production practices and short run strategic implications of remittance investment in livestock. The resulting model is one of brinksmanship leading to a war-of-attrition over resource use. Laboratory experiments demonstrate heterogeneous outcomes ranging from cooperative economically efficient to heavier exploitation of the resource. Though consistent with the findings from past long run analyses, these results are largely due to mixed strategies and behavioral attributes, such as assertive and aggressive behaviors not previously identified.

We estimate the effect of drought and opportunity to sell water to state-managed Drought Water Banks, on land fallowing patterns of rice farmers in three private surface water irrigation districts in Northern California. The analysis is based on 30 years (1984-2013) of spatial data derived from satellite data on fallowing decisions matched to highly detailed ownership data at the farm parcel level. We find that drought episodes, and the presence of a Drought Water Bank increase fallowed area and the likelihood to fallow. We examine the effect of each Drought Water Bank separately, finding significant differences among them. We also find that some water sale restrictions imposed by local or state authorities have significantly affected land fallowing. These findings have ramifications for water management in future California droughts.