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Halvorson (
2012
), Bogardi et al. (
2012
), Granit et al. (
2013
), and Siddiqi and
Wescoat (
2013
) to cite a few of the burgeoning set of publications on the WEF
Nexus. In parallel fashion, and again approximately co-terminously with research
developments in the mid-2000s, institutional support for the WEF Nexus gained
signi
cant momentum via the Bonn Freshwater Conference, the Bonn 2011 Nexus
Conference, the Stockholm World Water Week, the United Nations Economic
Commission for Europe, and the now well established Water, Energy, and Food
Security Nexus Resource Platform Nexus.
2
A series of broader international initiatives to develop a coherent and compre-
hensive analytical framework for WEF Nexus, particularly as related to sustainable
development, have emerged. This includes
The Nexus between Energy, Food,
Land Use, and Water: Application of a Multi-Scale Integrated Approach
'
,
3
which
applies the Multi-Scale Integrated Analysis of Societal and Ecosystem Metabolism
(MuSIASEM) to case studies such as sugarcane biofuel in Mauritius, groundwater
irrigation in Punjab, India, and alternative electrical generation in South Africa. The
metabolism approach of MuSIASEM represents a social-ecological system of
understanding linked to resource use (Madrid et al.
2013
).
The November 16
'
-
18, 2011
'
Water, Energy and Food Security Nexus
—
Solu-
'
tions for the Green Economy
Bonn 2011 conference, in particular, provided an
institutional platform and continuity to WEF Nexus initiatives. Follow up to Bonn
2011 includes a series of regional dialogues, private-sector participation including a
focus on infrastructure and investment, practical tools (analytical models, best
practices, etc.), and knowledge-based assessments of the nexus. These contributed
to the Rio 2012 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development and a
subsequent series of international meetings focusing on the nexus, including those
held in Stockholm and Dresden. UNU-FLORES in Dresden was established to
advance the nexus approach to integrated management of environmental resources:
water, waste and soil (UNU-FLORES
2013
). UNU-FLORES will extend and
upscale the nexus concept through adopting an integrative framework by consid-
ering inter-related resources (water, soil, waste) and emphasizing
fluxes of
resources between phases and compartments (Lall
2013
). Given the limitations of
the conventional technology-transfer model, it is acknowledged that capacity
development approaches that aim to facilitate technology adaptation offer a better
chance of achieving integrated management of environmental resources. Continued
institutional development for the nexus includes the 2014 World Water Week in
Stockholm on the theme,
'
Water and Energy
—
Making the Link,
'
and the UNU-
FLORES 2015 Nexus Conference.
2
See
http://www.water-energy-food.org/
for more information.
3
UN Food and Agriculture Organisation
—
FAO with support from the Deutsche Gesellschaft f
ü
r
Internationale Zusammenarbeit
—
GIZ.
See
also
for more
information.
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