This research explores the aspects of groundwater consumption in irrigation and pricing attitudes of farmers working in the North-Western Bangladesh, a region that is currently experiencing very serious effects of groundwater depletion, exacerbated by inefficient pricing mechanisms. Utilizing choice experiments and latent class analysis, the research discovers three groups of farmers, based on their price model preferences: small-scale farmers, who prefer tiered pricing for fairness; medium-scale farmers, who prefer volumetric and marginal cost pricing, indicating efficiencies and conservation; and large-scale farmers, who prefer block pricing based on convenience. Higher groundwater prices have been shown to result in lower levels of consumption, which actually suggests water-saving behavior, particularly when using technologies like Alternate Wetting and Drying (AWD). However, the low adoption rates of these technologies underscore the need for government intervention in the form of subsidies and awareness-raising initiatives. The current pricing system supports farmer groups who use privately owned tube wells. This study recommends a hybrid pricing system that consists of tiered and volumetric pricing to address issues of equity and sustainability, as well as improvements to infrastructure, metering systems, and market policies to enhance sustainability and equity in the region's groundwater irrigation markets.
