Drought Chile

The Water-Energy-Food Security Nexus (WEF Nexus) is currently a highly important debate in environmental policy with expected implications for priorities in research, education and international cooperation. Increasing demands for water, energy and food together with external and internal change drivers on current natural resources use patterns make the Nexus idea crucial to understand the multiple resource use interlinkages. The ITT invited partners from current Nexus-related projects for an international gathering from the 11th until the 15th of July 2016. The Nexus Research and Education Week invited also external presenters and students into the discussion on how to address together many of the key interlinkages like sustainable land and water management practices, climate related risks in terms of droughts and extremes or increasing resource use efficiencies along river basins.

During the Nexus Week, the professor Mauricio Zambrano-Bigiarini along with international partners presented their case studies from related projects as nexus laboratories useful for enhancing educational contents and outlining future collaborative research activities. International experts and young researchers were involved in providing insights on the WEF Nexus topic from ongoing research and and outlining further research demand. Different case studies with WEF-Nexus related topics at river basin scale were presented from countries such as Jordan, Sudan, Ethiopia, Egypt, Pakistan, Chile, Ecuador, Costa Rica and Colombia and also larger scales as the Mekong, the Nile and Paraiba do Sul region or even global scale. The Nexus Week aimed at expanding the network of partners related to Nexus topics and interdisciplinary regional and basin planning initiatives and offered an opportunity as an exchange platform. During additional side events of the Nexus Week, the participants developed new project ideas and exchanged experiences on integrated water basin management during a visit to the International Commission for the Protection of the Rhine. Further more, different Nexus products were presented and prepared for further development in the future.

For more information about the project please visit the website: http://www.water-energy-food-nexus.info