hence in global water use would have been higher and irrigation water depletion would have been higher if not for international trade de fraiture et al the authors caution against inferring that trade will be helpful in mitigating global water scarcity however given that water savings cannot always be reallocated to beneficial uses and that political and economic considerations might have greater influence than water scarcity in determining national trading strategies in their analysis of data describing water availability and international trade for countries the authors find that observed trading patterns are not consistent with those predicted by the virtual water metaphor