Publications
Harmony in Action
Dec 2020
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White Paper: Mainstreaming Water, Energy, and Food in National and Municipal Policies in Selected Countries in the MENA Region
Dr. Marwan Al Raggad, et. al.
Despite the fact that the nexus approach to policy planning and opportunities in the MENA region are fairly different, but the priorities in various countries are very similar. For instance, due to its climate conditions and availability of land, Jordan is considered more ready to use solar energy. Such opportunities could present entry points for the countries to mainstream WEF nexus approach. In terms of the level of progress made in degree of WEF nexus mainstreaming amongst the focus countries, it is rather different. Whereby, some countries are actively seeking more integrated policies, arising from different needs or drivers, while others are still lagging behind with no clear vision for integrated policies. Existing strategies in the MENA region both on national and regional levels should be revisited and modified to have a more integrated approach. In addition, further efforts are needed to ensure proper implementation of the few existing strategies that are already integrated. A “nexus” approach should be considered as guidance to the design of any project, in particular the conceptual stages while looking for possible “integrated” alternatives for what is currently being proposed. The nexus approach is not only about reducing tradeoffs and improving efficiencies between the different sectors it asks for a complete rethinking of the purpose of the project and how it contributes to resource security in general. The following concepts are common requirements if advanced nexus will be implemented: • Conducting a baseline assessment of the WEF sectors. Accounting for water is a key issue that private sector should consider. Water must be valued, and risks of water scarcity quantified and incorporated into financial modeling for all businesses and industries. • Exploring alternative uses for treated wastewater (including in urban areas) and working on treated wastewater quality assurance. • Enhancing exchange of data and improved monitoring data is key for the implantation of WEF nexus. • Increasing the awareness of local communities and stakeholders such as farmers in order to increase social acceptance and buy in. A participatory approach and increasing accountability could be drivers to a behavioral change towards unconventional methods of applying the nexus. • Private-Public partnerships with social equity provisions could help in advancing the implementation of the nexus and mobilizing resources towards its financing. • Identifying, studying, proposing, and promoting regional water-energy-food nexus projects and areas of cooperation that have significant mutual economic and social benefits to each party. Such initiatives will increase the rate of cooperation and constructive dialogue in the region, thus building confidence and trust. Furthermore, regional mega projects should also be considered such as desalination, large-scale conveyance, cross-border renewable energy generation, and large-scale irrigation efficiency initiatives. Mega projects would require high levels of trust among country partners to commence. However, once initiated, they would act as a long-lasting bond between countries and a cause for continuous cooperation and collaboration.
Dec 2020
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Position Paper: Mainstreaming Water, Energy, and Food in National and Municipal Policies in Selected Countries in the MENA Region
Dr. Marwan Al Raggad, et. al.
A WEF Nexus Approach in the Arab region, and focus countries, can provide great benefits. Adopting such an approach will guarantee achieving the sustainable development goals, whereby the interdependency among water, food, and energy in the focus countries are strongly and closely interlinked. These countries are all part of the Arab region, this region is considered to be one of the most vulnerable regions in the world, and is highly affected by climate change. The policy landscape from the water-energy-food framework is complex and fragmented, where these sectors are usually viewed independently of each other. Water, energy, and food security are vital concepts when considering the sustainability in the future of the Arab world. Due to the adoption of certain policies, the focus countries have been able to tackle the nexus challenge, and set a tone to the sustainable development of the region in the years to come. National and regional efforts to address many environmental issues have presented an extraordinary opportunity for a needed institutional reform in order to mainstream the nexus thinking in policy development and implementation. In order to achieve effective resource management, the institutional framework governing the elements of the WEF nexus need to be strengthened. Some countries presented different models of integrated institutions, however the interlinking of their priorities still needs support, as many institutions governing these sectors are fragmented because of the existence of multiple and overlapping jurisdictions. The institutional framework that governs the elements of the WEF nexus in these countries is mainly fragmented which delays the comprehensive and inclusive management of these interlinked priorities. Which consequently led to a sectoral approach to policy planning, rather than an interlinked one. The fragmentation also arises from within the sector itself, where more than one authority is responsible of governance. For example, in Jordan, one ministry controls allocation of water, while another controls irrigation water use. Hence, good environmental governance can be achieved if there is equality and equity presented in policy and strategy formulation. Tapping into the Nexus Approach confirms several opportunities to increasing awareness in policy making and piloting research projects and small-scale projects. The ultimate aim is to have institutions that are able to mainstream and reflect the WEF Nexus Approach in policies in Arab countries in light of the mandate and targets of both the SDGs. This is important because it guarantees that no rising resource insecurities delay their sustainable development path. When adopting and implementing an “integrated nexus approach”, coordination and collaboration mechanisms are vital mechanisms.
Oct 2024
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Case Study
Scenarios on Water Politics in the Euphrates-Tigris Basin 2040
INWRDAM
The Euphrates-Tigris basin, encompassing regions of Turkey, Syria, Iraq, and parts of the Tigris basin within Iran, has experienced heightened diplomatic strain since the 1960s due to unilateral irrigation activities impacting river flows, and compounded by geopolitical discord. Cold War affiliations, with Turkey’s NATO alignment opposing Syria and Iraq’s USSR associations, infused additional complexity into water disputes. And the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) issue and territorial claims further fueled discord among riparians until the mid-2000s. The 1980s and 1990s marked peak conflict, with water being utilized as a strategic leverage. Notably, a 1987 accord between Turkey and Syria addressed water allocation and PKK tensions, illustrating the intertwining of water management with broader geopolitical issues. After years of stalemated cooperation efforts, the late 1990s and early 2000s saw improved diplomatic relations, enabling renewed dialogue and the establishment of frameworks such as the Euphrates-Tigris Initiative for Cooperation (ETIC) to facilitate scientific and policy collaboration on water management. Enhanced cooperation in the new millennium can be attributed to internal policy shifts in Turkey, particularly under the Justice and Development Party’s (AKP) “zero problems with neighbors” doctrine, and external influences such as Turkey’s EU accession prospects, which shaped its environmental policy framework. Furthermore, a conciliatory regional political climate facilitated the alignment of strategic objectives among the riparian states. Nevertheless, the absence of a trilateral framework until now hinders collective environmental stewardship. Despite initial strides in cooperation in the late 1990s and early 2000s, exemplified by the Joint Technical Committee meetings and Joint Communiqués, formal ratifications of Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) on water management have stalled, with parliamentary rejections symptomatic of persisting mistrust. The Syrian civil war and the emergence of the so-called Islamic State (IS) further strained diplomatic channels, halting progress in water governance and preventing effective transboundary management. Indeed, the rise of IS has had a significant impact on water security in the Euphrates-Tigris basin. IS’s actions exacerbated existing tensions between riparian states by disrupting water-sharing agreements and cooperation, contributing to regional instability. Until today, these actions pose challenges for the reconstruction and management of shared water resources in a sustainable and cooperative manner.
Sep 2022
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Reports
Towards Developing a SEMED Water Knowledge Platform
INWRDAM
At the cross-roads of three continents, the Mediterranean region is one of the most historic, culturally rich and diverse regions in the world. Endowed with unique geographical, ecological and geopolitical features, it benefits from the continuous exchanges across peoples and territories. In a constantly changing world, the Mediterranean faces serious natural and human-made challenges, including water scarcity, population growth, migration, industrialization, urbanization, pollution, and climate and other environmental change, along with the proliferation of energy-intensive lifestyles. These issues entail a rather blurry picture for the present and the future of the Mediterranean region, posing threats also to its water security. Not far from the Mare Nostrum, the MENA region (Middle East and North Africa) extending, south of the Mediterranean Sea, from Morocco to Egypt and, east of the Mediterranean Sea, from Yemen across the countries of the Arabian Peninsula all the way to Syria is also facing a particularly alarming situation of water, making it as one of the most water insecure regions of the planet. Annual renewable water supplies in MENA are approximately 620 billion cubic meters (BCM), compared to Africa’s almost 4000 BCM, Asia’s 12,000 BCM, and a world total of approximately 43,000 BCM. In 2015, the World bank estimated that MENA’s per capita annual water availability is estimated on average of only 1,200 cubic meters, around six times less than the worldwide average of 7,000 cubic meters which is below the amount needed to prevent a significant constraint on socio-economic development, making the region the most water stressed in the world. Indeed, many MENA countries suffer from levels as low as 10 percent of the MENA regional figure, the same source reported. The region has approximately seven percent of the world’s population and less than 1.5 percent of the world’s renewable freshwater supply. This has led experts to predict that stress on water endowments and supplies in the region could in turn spur conflict and population displacement in the world’s most water-scarce region. The Southern and Eastern Mediterranean (SEMED) countries are a part of the MENA region, excluding some countries such as the Arabian Peninsula countries. SEMED countries are no exception to the situation in the MENA region. The SEMED region’s current water challenges go far beyond age-old constraints of water scarcity. While the region’s water scarcity challenges have been apparent for hundreds of years, newer challenges are adding both hazards and complexity. The complexities of the water-food-energy Nexus , climate change, droughts and floods, water quality, transboundary water management, and the management of water in the context of fragility, conflict, and violence compound the challenge of water scarcity. Meeting these challenges will depend as much on better management of water resources as on more and better resource endowments, infrastructure investments, and technologies.
Oct 2022
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Case Study
Natural Resource Governance in Light of the 2030 Agenda
Dombrowsky, I., et. al.
This study analyses natural resource governance taking the case of competition for groundwater in Azraq, Jordan against the backdrop of the 2030 Agenda. In doing so, it: • adopts a social-ecological system (SES) perspective to emphasise the interactions and interdependencies between the human and natural worlds. The study is rooted in the social sciences but given the need for interdisciplinary approaches to tackle intertwined socioecological challenges, it also considers natural science insights. • consistently and systematically applies the Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) framework and the concept of Networks of Adjacent Action Situations (NAAS) to capture the complexity of the SES. It makes the NAAS concept practically applicable for studying action situations (ASs) and their exogenous variables at various levels of society – which few studies have attempted. • adds a political dimension to the NAAS frame by including aspects of power to address a shortcoming in the literature. Aspects of power are represented in the concepts of wasta (nepotism) and the “social contract”. • assesses how the SES performs against the 2030 Agenda. It analyses system outcomes of the relevant Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2, 6, 8 and 15. It also presents an operationalisation of the 2030 Agenda’s core principles – leaving no one behind (LNOB), interconnectedness and indivisibility, multi-stakeholder partnerships and inclusiveness – and evaluates the system dynamics against this backdrop. • builds upon a comprehensive literature review, a social network analysis (SNA) and 67 semistructured interviews conducted between February and April 2020. This study finds: • At the local level, the Azraq aquifer is an example of an unsustainably used common-pool groundwater resource, which is exploited at least 260 per cent above its safe yield. The original wetland and its diverse ecosystem have largely disappeared; the remainder is artificially maintained. The main line of conflict runs between a heterogeneous group of farmers who use groundwater for irrigation, and the central government, which relies on the aquifer for the national domestic water supply and has recently started to more strictly regulate access, albeit inconsistently. • At the national level, a stable supply of freshwater for domestic use sourced from aquifers like Azraq is a pillar of social stability, which is of paramount importance due to the regional instabilities. Water authorities prioritise domestic water over groundwater-based irrigation agriculture that often yields low economic returns. But they face a powerful agricultural lobby that is intertwined with Jordan’s legislative and executive organs. This case study highlights the virtually non-existent discourse about water allocation and the Jordanian social contract that provides elites in the monarchy with privileges, including access to water for desert farming. It also shows that the participants and content of the social contract are slowly changing.
Feb 2022
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Reports
Improving agricultural water use efficiency and productivity in the Middle East
Melvyn Kay - implemented under Blue Peace Middle East initiative, supported by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) and Turkish Water Institute (SUEN).
This report is prepared under the umbrella of the “Blue Peace Middle East " initiative. It focuses on water scarcity, the challenges this brings to irrigated agriculture, and the options available to improve water use efficiency (WUE) and, in turn, increase water productivity and crop production. The countries evaluated in this report include Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Turkey. Although Iran and Syria are not currently active members of Blue Peace ME, given their location and relevance to this review, they are included in this study. Irrigated agriculture plays a vital role in the economies, livelihoods and well-being of people living in the studied countries, but the sector is under severe pressure. More than 75% of available freshwater resources are already withdrawn for agriculture, mostly irrigation, exceeding 90% in some countries. Growing rural and urban populations, economic growth, improvements in lifestyle, and changing diets are driving water demand and have led FAO to predict that if the world continues “business as usual”, the water demand for irrigation could double by 2050. Concerns also come from migration and rural employment, the impacts of climate change on water resources and agriculture, the damage that economic growth can inflict on the aquatic environment, and the challenges of coping with unexpected shocks, such as floods, droughts, and latterly COVID-19.