The Food–Energy–Water Nexus: A Framework to Address Sustainable Development in the Tropics

Abstract

Interactions between agriculture, energy, and tropical environments occur within a larger, interconnected food-energywater (FEW) system context. These interactions both affect and are shaped by the FEW nexus (connected FEW natural processes, engineering and infrastructure, and institutions and governance), motivating the collective inclusion of many processes and institutions in the discussion of any individual member. Moreover, the important role of the tropics in the global environment and global food security raises the stakes of management, providing further impetus for a thorough, FEW nexus approach. We herein discuss FEW issues which are key to proper FEW nexus management in the tropics, including fundamental earth system processes, agricultural expansion and deforestation, the potential benefits and drawbacks of hydropower development, and technology and policy advancements.

Harmonizing Goals for Agricultural Intensification and Human Health Protection in Sub-Saharan Africa

“…To achieve lasting and consequential gains in nutritional security, efforts toward agricultural intensification should account for interactions with health and other-related dimensions of development (e.g., water and sanitation, education, energy; Sanchez, Denning, & Nziguheba, 2009;Wallington & Cai, 2017). In this effort, planners must identify and understand diverse, locally relevant, and often uncertain variables and decisions, such as those related to hydrology, climate, local soil quality, chemical storage and application practices, the types of fertilizers and pesticides available, knowledge and applicability of organic farming practices, and water sources (Godfray et al, 2010;Michelson, 2017;Mueller et al, 2012).…”

Evaluation on the Efficiency of Water-Energy-Food Nexus Based on Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and Malmquist in Different Regions of China

“…From 1980 to 2011, there was a sense of research and project development on Water-Energy-Food (W-E-F) nexus around the world, such as Japan, India, and the USA. The nexus could be dated back to the World Economic Forum in 2008, where the global challenges related to economic development were recognized from the W-E-F nexus perspective [3,4]. At the same time, more and more international organizations and universities attempted to consider the social, political, economic, and environment for the W-E-F nexus.…”

“…Numerous studies on W-E-F nexus focus on interaction [4,14,15], one-way efficiency [16][17][18] and the nexus between the two resources [19]. For example, water, energy, and food are included in the same system study [3], sustainable development [3,4,[20][21][22], energy utilization efficiency [20,23], and water-food coupled relationship. Liao et al [24] analyzed the life-cycle water uses for energy consumption.…”

Projecting Pathways to Food–Energy–Water Systems Sustainability Through Ontology

“…T he food-energy-water (FEW) nexus (e.g., Martin-Nagle et al 2011;World Economic Forum, 2011;Endo et al, 2015Endo et al, , 2017 is an integrated approach to optimize the use of the closely interlinked FEW resources, manage processes that affect them at different scales, and achieve sustainable growth by reducing risks, tradeoffs, and conflicts, and improve governance across sectors (Bazilian et al, 2011;Hoff, 2011;Hussey and Pittock, 2012;Ringler et al, 2013;Biggs et al, 2015;Mohtar and Lawford, 2016;Scanlon et al, 2017;Wallington and Cai, 2017;Weitz et al, 2017). Sustainable development of the FEW systems requires continuous governance, assessment, and evaluation of the consequences of complex processes that affect FEW systems' intersecting environmental, social, cultural, political, legal, economic, and other dimensions (Wackernagel and Rees, 1996;Kates et al, 2001;Verheem, 2002).…”