Sub-RésEAU MENA Webinar on WEFE Nexus in the Middle East

The Sub-RésEAU MENA organized a Webinar for its members.

The “nexus” approach to managing interconnected water, energy, food and ecosystems (WEFE) resources aims at building synergies and at the same time reducing trade-offs between the often ‘firewalled’ sectors.

It can be applied at various scales, from the very local to the national to the transboundary, regional level. WEFE thinking and implementation has a great potential for sustainable solutions, concretely leading to better water, energy, food and environmental security. In the Middle East and North Africa, challenges in the WEFE domain are manyfold and often acerbated by climate change and other mega-trends.

This webinar is a direct follow-up of the AGUASAN workshop in Jordan in 2022, where the WEFE nexus was identified as one of the four priority areas. Goal of the webinar is to present current international thinking (within the UNECE Water convention and other international processes and research); draw lessons learned from regions where WEFE has already been tested and outline possible approaches for the Middle East and North Africa both at the transboundary, and at the national level.

Speakers:

Dr. Tuğba Evrim Maden, Policy Development Coordinator at SUEN Turkish Water Institute, former Head of Blue Peace Middle East Coordination Office, Istanbul.

Dr. Hakam Al Alami, Member of Managing Committee for the Blue Peace in the Middle East Initiative, Amman.

Lucia de Strasser, Environmental Affairs Officer, United Nations Economic Commission (UNECE), Geneva.