The 5TOI EWAS project (http://www.5toi.eu) is funded under the Horizon 2020 programme involving 24 organisations from 13 countries and aims at encouraging the research and innovation cooperation between the Union and Southern Mediterranean Neighbourhood in the areas covered by the Water, Energy and agrofood Nexus. One of the main tools implemented to pursue this objective is a high level experts’ Group known as Nexus Think Tank (NTT) whose mission is to produce position papers on the main challenges faced by south Mediterranean countries in developing innovation path, with the final goal to produce policy recommendations conveyed to both national and international policy makers.
During the next weeks we will publish the abstracts of these papers, the full version of which can by accessed through the project’s website and can be downloaded by clicking here: www.5toi.eu/think-tank/ntt-papers/
We start with a comprehensive paper written by Dr. Imad Ibrik, currently coordinator of EU projects at An-Najah University in Palestine: the title of the paper is “WATER-ENERGY-FOOD NEXUS IN PALESTINE”.
Addressing water scarcity, both natural and human-induced is considered one of the major and most critical challenges facing Palestine and Arab countries as well. This challenge is expected to grow in the future due to many pressing driving forces, including population growth, food demand, unsettled and politicized shared water resources, climate change, and many others, forcing more countries to adopt more expensive technologies, such as desalination, to augment their limited fresh water supplies. The heavy financial, economic, environmental, as well as social costs and burden to be borne cannot be overemphasized. Furthermore, the water scarcity challenge in Palestine is being compounded by its multiple nexuses with the various development sectors, such as water and human health, water and environment, water and food, water and energy, and many other interdependencies, which carry within them many cross-cutting issues of human rights, social, economic, legal, technical, political, and security nature. It is therefore important to address much more explicitly the various linkages of the water sector with other sectors like energy, food, health, and economic development as a whole. Moreover professionals in all sectors should think and act beyond the boundaries of their own sector, to achieve effective and integrated resources planning and management.
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