The growing awareness of the food, energy, water nexus — last week, experts from around North America and the world gathered at the University of North Carolina, Chapel-Hill to dig into the topic of the food, energy, water nexus. This was just the latest in the emerging space of "nexus" discussions.
An explosion of interest in sustainability standards
If we increase food production, it comes at the cost of energy, water and land. If we reduce the amount of water used in a system, we also save on energy costs (and often carbon). For better or worse, production systems, especially in a finite world, are linked and interconnected, and thus we have the challenge of the "nexus".
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Alexis Morgan
works for WWF- the global conservation organization on water stewardship with a heavy focus on standards, the food-energy-water nexus, and economically-based solutions. Over the past decade he has worked on a wide array of business and biodiversity issues, including sustainability metrics, infrastructure projects and helping to develop a global water standard under the Alliance for Water Stewardship. He is a part-time lecturer in urban environmental economics at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada, and sits on the the 2degrees Community Advisory Board as well as the ISEAL Alliance Stakeholder Council. He has a BA in Geography, and MSc in urban hydro-ecology and an MBA in strategy & sustainability.
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This article was originally published on the website of the {https://www.2degreesnetwork.com/groups/2degrees-community/resources/will-sustainability-standards-help-solve-or-hinder-water-food-energy-nexus/|2degree community}.
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In addition to the growing interest in the nexus, the last decade has seen an explosion of interest in environmental and social certifications and ecolabels (or what I will broadly call "sustainability standards"). Indeed, the {http://www.ecolabelindex.com/|Ecolabel Index} currently tracks nearly 450 ecolabels while the World Trade Organization backed Trade for Sustainable Development (T4SD) provides a {http://www.standardsmap.org/|database} with over 120 standards. Marks & Spencer, Walmart, Edeka, Coop, Loblaws and many other major retailers have initiated substantive "sustainability commitments" and are heavily relying upon these sorts of sustainability standards. So there is little question that these standards are a key part of the sustainability landscape when it comes to food, energy and water. But what about when we consider these issues from an integrated, so-called "nexus" angle: will these sustainability standards help or hinder the food-energy-water nexus?
It is important to note from the outset that many (if not most) of these standards are focused on a single commodity. For example, standards for organic produce, sustainably-harvested pulp/paper, responsible palm oil or soy, better cotton — you get the picture. Often these standards DO consider aspects of water, energy, or carbon, but they typically "lightly touch" each of the areas (e.g., "use less water", "lower your carbon footprint") with little consideration for either (A) trade-offs, or (B) context.
The implications (A) and (B) above are that each commodity "maximizes" (to the potential detriment of itself and others), and can often pursue solutions that may be less-than-meaningful given their context. An example helps to illustrate: if a site implements an organic standard, it is likely to consider some aspects of water (e.g., pesticides, water quality contamination, access to water for water fowl), but largely ignores water consumption, and even has a degree of perverse incentive for allowing burning of materials to enrich soil carbon. So, while implementation of an organic standard might benefit some aspects of the nexus, it ignores or in fact may take away from other aspects.
So are standards useless to help tackle the nexus challenge? No.
The evolution of sustainability standard systems
First, we have to recognize that there is a spectrum of sustainability standards from very weak to very strong. Within this range, some standards are much more robust than others in how they think of the tradeoffs and optimization. One example of a "next generation" standard is the {http://www.allianceforwaterstewardship.org/|Alliance for Water Stewardship} which not only considers contextual aspects of water use, but also begins to push towards interoperability (by recognizing other standard systems) and nexus considerations (having users justify trade offs, even if they're not optimizing).
There is a clear and present need for this huge "ecosystem" of sustainability standards, and in particular, those that are on the stronger end of the spectrum (such as those within the {http://www.isealalliance.org/|ISEAL Alliance}) to begin to explicitly work together to address this shared challenge.
The risk of NOT beginning to address the food-energy-water nexus within sustainability standards is real and pressing. At best, efforts go uncoordinated; but at worst, those working towards an improved planet through such standards run the risk of having zero net impact. The gains from one standard could be offset by the losses from another. In this sense, a lack of coordination between standard systems poses a major threat to progress.
Tackling the complexity of tradeoffs: YIMBY (yes in my backyard)
In addition to coordination, there is the question of optimization. At a systems level, optimizing a global food-energy-water system is bewildering and verging on near impossible (as we've unfortunately seen from multi-lateral government discussions on carbon!). So how can we make this tangible and feasible? My solution: bring it to the catchment scale and optimize locally while considering global boundaries.
Here's what I mean. Water is a very helpful parameter when thinking about tackling the food-energy-water nexus and the reason is, is that it is a local issue (something we need to discuss at a neighbourhood scale). Sure, water is traded virtually through food (primarily), but unlike energy which is transported long distances, or food (which goes even further), or carbon (which is a global pool), water is locally managed and naturally binds us together. Everyone needs it, everyone uses it, and (like religion and politics) everyone has an opinion on it. Fortunately, unlike religion and politics, we can talk water over the dinner table, or better yet, in public-sector led integrated water resource management "fora" (e.g., "catchment authorities", "watershed boards" or "basin councils"). These water-based governance bodies are a perfect starting point to begin stakeholder discussions on the trade-offs that are going to be necessary. And while we must always consider carbon at a global level, energy and food are somewhat regional (and even local), so they can be realistically factored into a catchment in how water can be allocated to optimize benefits for all.
Optimizing benefits for all
"Benefit optimization" is a very challenging issue, but thankfully we've got some help there as it lies squarely at the heart of economics — though perhaps not economics as usual. I would suggest that optimizing benefits in the nexus context needs not only be about maximizing the GDP of a catchment ($-per-crop-per-drop-per-CO2e-per-KWh), but rather be about optimizing human wellbeing as measured by a range of indicators (e.g., Genuine Progress Indicators, Gross National Happiness Index, etc.).
In summary, sustainability standards are a critical piece of the sustainability landscape that are presently ill-prepared to handle the food-energy-water nexus. However, through a combination of improved quality, better inter-operability, and catchment-based optimization (based upon human wellbeing), I believe they can play a key role in helping us tackle what stands as THE challenge of this new millennium.
