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Water, Energy & Food Sustainability in the Middle East pp 21–43Cite as

The Triangle: Energy, Water & Food Nexus for Sustainable Security in the Arab Middle East

Abstract

This chapter examines water security in the broader relationships governing the Food-Water-Energy-Climate Nexus. It particularly stresses the role of the great global transmissions of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in presenting intractable barriers to returning to less complicated eras of resource conflicts. These transitions are manifest in total and urban populations’ growth and shift to urbanization; radical shifts in the nutrition demanded by the new economic and social developments; the radical changes in land use and chemicals in agriculture; a rapid shift in emphasis on renewable energy resources and reduced reliance on fossil fuels; and finally the great challenge of climate change. All of these transitions have major implications for water security both globally, and regionally. Globally this is well articulated by DuBois (The case for “energy-smart food for people and climate”. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, World Food Day-Oct 16, 2015):

Our agrifood systems currently consume 30 percent of the world’s available energy—with more than 70 percent occurring beyond the farm gate, and produce about 20 percent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. More than one third of the food we produce is lost or wasted, and with it about 38 percent of the energy consumed in the agrifood chain.

To this we can add that the greatest loss of water in the overall national water balances is that of the water used to grow the food that is wasted.

While the water security situation for the Arab Middle East Region is generally considered bleak, the paper is fairly optimistic that, at least water resource use, until 2050 will be still manageable if the eleven “technical fixes,” outlined in the paper are pursued. These technical fixes are not to be construed as purely engineering the water supply, but fixes to many of the economic and social barriers to a more secure water future. They cover major national policy choices such as international trade in virtual water, traditional water engineering of traditional and non-traditional sources, improving efficiency in use via agronomic research, improvement of post harvest food and value chains, and softer options such as trading among users, pricing, rationalizing property rights and legal protection for third parties.

Keywords

  • Agrifood
  • Water security
  • Food security

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Gordon McKay Research Professor of Environmental Engineering, John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, 02138, USA

    Peter Rogers

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  1. Peter Rogers
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Correspondence to Peter Rogers .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Chemical and Biological Engineering, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, Illinois, USA

    Sohail Murad

  2. Department of Biology, American University of Beirut, Beirut, Lebanon

    Elias Baydoun

  3. Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences, American University of Beirut, Beirut, Lebanon

    Nuhad Daghir

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Rogers, P. (2017). The Triangle: Energy, Water & Food Nexus for Sustainable Security in the Arab Middle East. In: Murad, S., Baydoun, E., Daghir, N. (eds) Water, Energy & Food Sustainability in the Middle East. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-48920-9_2

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