The MENA region is on a non-sustainable trajectory. It is quickly running out of natural resources such as water and arable land, using its resources inefficiently (often associated with high consumption rates and fractions of waste, while not providing food-, water- and energy-security to all of its people. Such environment and development related challenges also contribute to political instability.
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) promise new impetus for reconciling environment and development agendas. This integration of environmental sustainability and socio-economic development has been on the international agenda at least since the Rio Conference in 1992 but never systematically addressed, let alone implemented. The comprehensive set of SDGs and targets, agreed upon in 2015, is now awaiting implementation - in each of the MENA countries and everywhere else. This obligation, assumed by all nations, provides an excellent opportunity for bringing together a broad range of stakeholders and sectors behind common goals. For that to happen however, a systematic approach is needed for integrated implementation of SDGs: “The interlinkages and integrated nature of the SDGs are of crucial importance in ensuring that the purpose of the new Agenda is realized” (quote from “Transforming our World: the 2030 Agenda”).
Here the nexus approach comes in, which has been steadily developed since its launch at the Bonn Conference in 2011. It systematically addresses and quantifies critical interlinkages among and between natural resources and human securities, thus having become an environment-development nexus.
A High Level Meeting on Water, Energy and Food Security Nexus, held by the League of Arab States (LAS) in Cairo on 16-17 March, 2016 endorsed the application of the nexus concept for integrated implementation of the SDGs by its member countries. GIZ has agreed to support LAS in operationalizing and mainstreaming the nexus approach in the MENA region. In close cooperation with various sectoral and cross-sectoral institutions, a team of international, regional and national experts from three pilot countries is now synthesizing relevant knowledge and developing a roadmap, guidelines and practical tools for overcoming the silos in which policy has been caught for too long.
Various synergies across SD goals and targets and opportunities for policy coherence have already been identified. For example, almost all MENA countries have developed renewable energy strategies and policies. These entail great opportunities but also risks and costs: on the one hand the MENA region is endowed with (nearly) unlimited renewable energies, in particular solar energy, which not only supports energy security but can also boost water and food security (e.g. through desalination). If, on the other hand, renewables are implemented along the conventional sectoral approach, negative externalities may occur; e.g., large additional water demands depending on the technologies and locations chosen. Also the cost of renewable energy is not yet competitive in most cases, so co-benefits need to be promoted (e.g., solar energy farming as income alternative to water-intensive irrigated crop farming).
What is required, hence, is a nexus approach guided by scientific analysis, and driven by political will and regional cooperation. The last of these ingredients – regional cooperation – is not only critical for successful nexus mainstreaming, but may in itself become one of the most important outcomes of the nexus. There are ample opportunities for regional cooperation along the water, energy, land/food nexus, ranging from regional power pools, transboundary river basin management, mutually agreed sustainable international investment in land to comprehensive food security strategies – all of which depend on integration across sectors and cooperation within and between MENA countries.
LAS and its ministerial councils on water, energy, agriculture and environment send a very positive message, by adopting a nexus approach for implementation of the SDGs in the MENA region. Initially this will be tested in three pilot countries, through mainstreaming into national water, energy and agricultural policies and investments. Eventually, through transfer of initial experience and successes to the wider region, this initiative may become a key building block for sustainable development and eventually political stability and peace.
