A lower opportunity cost of water increases the net national benefits of measures that maintain irrigation infrastructure. A higher opportunity cost does the opposite. For example, in a region where values of water outside agriculture are high, due to water-sensitive or high-valued environments, or possibly due to growing cities, then investments in infrastructure maintenance will perform weakly. In fact it is in cases such as these where opportunity costs of water outside irrigation are considerable that it may pay to never renew irrigation infrastructure, and let it depreciate to the point of zero value in irrigation. A common belief by governments is that even if the government subsidizes the development of irrigation initially, they are less willing to assign adequate budgets to keep its infrastructure in top form. The high cost of maintenance is a major reason.