For a full paper on this subject, please refer to the links below: http://enviroscope.iges.or.jp/modules/envirolib/view.php?docid=3390 http://gis.gms-eoc.org/GMS2020_WS-MATERIALS/2.1.4%20Prabhakar_Climate_Risks_to_Agriculture.pdf

1. EARLY WARNING SYSTEMS FOR
FOOD-WATER-ENERGY NEXUS IN
GMS
SVRK Prabhakar
Senior Policy Researcher, IGES
International Conference on GMS 2020: Balancing Economic Growth and
Environmental Sustainability, Bangkok, Thailand. 20-21 Feb 2012

2. Food-Water-Energy Nexus
“Before the world’s fossil fuels are finally exhausted, it is likely that their extraction
will require an unimaginable amount of water”
Gérard Velter, general manager of Veolia Water for Africa, Middle East and India
“When measured in calories, the energy market is twenty times the food market.
So if governments would replace only 10% of global energy consumption with
first-generation biofuels, they in the same stroke would double agricultural
water withdrawals”
Peter Braebeck-Letmathe, Chairman, Nestle Group
“The share of biofuels in total use of coarse grains is projected to increase until
2015, reaching 13%”
UN FAO Agricultural Outlook 2010-2019
“The area currently under cultivation is 1.5 billion hectares, so if all that extra land
could be used it would represent an increase of one-third. In fact a lot of it
either should be left alone for environmental reasons or would be too
expensive to farm.”
The Economist special report on feeding the world
Keane, 2011

3. F-W-E Nexus
WEF, 2011

4. Why do we need EWSs for F-W-E?
 Food, water and energy systems are
 Finite
 complexly interconnected
 Catastrophic consequences of fluctuations in
one system effects each other
 Global oil crisis of 2008
 Biofuel boom during 2008-2010
 Global food crisis 2008 and 2011

5. The Food Crisis [and Peace]
Guardian, 2011
FAO, 2012
Did we know it was coming?

6. Reasons for Food Crisis
Assumptions Marco Lagi et al., 2011
Adverse weather (Drought in Australia) X
Land conversion to biofuel use O
Shifting investor speculative focus from mortgage and O
stock markets to commodity markets
Change in dietary patterns in developing countries X
Could EWSs avoided this catastrophic impact?

7. Real World Examples for EWS
 Energy:
 European Union-Russia proposal for building a EWS for energy
that simulates the supply and demand situation in the region
(European Union, 2009).
 Food production:
 Crop Weather Watch Group, India: Have failed to warn
impending crop losses and couldn’t take advantage of
recovering monsoon in 2004 drought.
 Several other drought monitoring tools being implemented in
the region including west-asia drought monitor based on USDA
drought monitor.
 Water:
 FMMC of MRC: hydro-meteorological network.

8. Issues with these EWSs
 Specialized: only energy or water or food
 Narrow based: e.g. do not consider the impact
of energy prices on food
 Limited to hazard-mitigation approach
(drought or flood forecasting)
 Not full-spectrum: limited to crop
establishment or output and do not forecast
prices

9. What an EWS Should be able to
do for F-W-E?
 Help visualize demand and supply situation of food, water, and
energy in the region on a short-, medium-, and long-term basis;
 Give projections on prices of food, water, and energy on an
immediate and long-term basis so that countries can make
preventive and proactive strategies;
 Help policy makers at various levels to plan appropriate crops, water
usage, and water conservation practices, and how energy is produced
and consumed at the regional and national scales;
 Help in appropriate allocation of resources for food and energy
production while keeping in view such constraints as environmental
health, climate change, food prices, and sustainability of resources
employed; and
 Help develop a set of standard operational procedures to be invoked
in a situation like the 2008 and 2011 food crisis.

10. SCHEMATIC REPRESENTATION OF A
SIMPLE EWS FOR F-W-E
Global
Productivity
Regional
National Demand for
Consumption
Local Food/Water/Energy
Export/Import
Ecological/bio-physical/socio-
economic/Climatic Constraints
Regional
National Allocation of
Resources
Local
Output
(food/water/energy)

11. Determinants of Early Warning
Systems
 How the system is defined in terms of
feedback connections between different
actors/components of the system.
 The precision with which the dynamic and
static forces are quantified and represented,
and
 Interpretation of the outcomes as against
what it actually means, with implications for
the institutions that use the EWS for policy
purposes.

12. Opportunities for EWSs in GMS
 The Mekong River. The Mekong River acts as a single
most important integrating factor, providing the
opportunity to develop the EWS around it.
 Institutional system. Institutions with regional
mandate such as the Mekong River Commission
(MRC) could have significant impact on the way
other institutions set policies and processes in
managing water resources facilitating a centralized
decision making system.
 Growing economic integration. Countries in the sub-
region are increasingly integrated in terms of
economic activities that is well studied (e.g., trade of
goods and services).

13. Challenges for EWS in GMS
 Complex nature of the food-water-energy nexus. This is
largely brought by the uncertainty in climate projections,
future growth patterns, and changing food preferences
of the people that can introduce many “unknowns” that
influence the effectiveness with which the EWS can
work.
 Poor availability of data. Real time and quality data are
often a problem in the sub-region and can greatly
influence the effectiveness of a EWS. Such approaches as
integrated river basin level resource management using
water balance models could be useful to avoid water
shortages. These are data-intensive approaches and lack
of quality data hinders their adoption and effectiveness.

14. Challenges Cont…
 Attitudinal factors of stakeholders. As with any other EWS,
different actors in the region may not trust the EWS and
may not consider it as a decision-making tool. Thus, there is
a need for awareness generation and capacity building of
different stakeholders.
 Poor development of regional coordination mechanisms for
the use of certain common natural resources. As an example
of both the solution and problem, disputes related to how
the water in the Mekong River should be equitably used by
various countries on upstream and downstream has not
been resolved. Development of a EWS may help resolve
this problem since stakeholders in the region would be able
to visualize how downstream users are affected by
overexploitation by upstream users, leading to amicable
allocation of water resources to individual countries.

15. Off-the Shelf Approaches to
Minimize Food-Water-Energy
Conflicts
 Identification and promotion of agro-technologies that
provide synergistic advantage in terms of improved
productivity, profits, and climate benefits.
 Moving to river-basin based water resource management
can enhance water use efficiency.
 Tapping the unrealized irrigation potential in the Basin.
 Improving weather forecasting systems and proper
communication of the same.
 Improving energy use efficiency in the region can reduce
demand for energy.
 Creating east-Asia energy community/grid can help
harmonize the demand and supply patterns of energy in
the region.

16. prabhakar@iges.or.jp
THANK YOU!