Land Use for Cotton in the Corn-Dominated Northern Plains of Texas: Trends and Drivers

The Northern High Plains is an important agricultural region in Texas accounting for approximately 60% of corn and 20% of cotton production in the state. Corn, the dominant crop in the region, occupies 40% of irrigated acres consuming 60% of total irrigation water. Other major irrigated crops grown in the region include cotton and grain sorghum. Although corn dominates irrigated land use, it appears economic and ecological factors are driving changes in land use patterns. This study used historic land use data to measure changes in acres planted to corn, cotton, and grain sorghum over time. An aggregate land use model was applied to develop relative crop-share equations for the three crops. These crop-share equations were simultaneously estimated using iterative Seemingly Unrelated Regression (SUR) to identify the factors influencing irrigated land use decisions in the region. Results revealed that lag-acreage and lag-prices impacted land allocation among all three irrigated crops.