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Report, 2020

Water and nutrition : harmonizing actions for the United Nations Decade of Action on Nutrition and the united nations Water Action decade

Ringler, Cloudia; Dias, Paolo; Chase, Claire; Choufani, Jowel; Lundqvist, Jan; Barron, Jennie; Dickens, Chris; Mateo-Sagasta, Javier; McCartney, Matthew; Young, Sera L.; de Souza, Marlos

Abstract

Progress for both SDG 2 and SDG 6 has been unsatisfactory, with several indicators worsening over time, including an increase in the number of undernourished, overweight and obese people, as well as rapid increases in the number of people at risk of severe water shortages. This lack of progress is exacerbated by climate change and growing regional and global inequities in food and water security, including access to good quality diets, leading to increased violation of the human rights to water and food. Reversing these trends will require a much greater effort on the part of water, food security, and nutrition communities, including stronger performances by the United Nations Decade of Action on Nutrition and the United Nations International Decade for Action on Water for Sustainable Development. To date, increased collaboration by these two landmark initiatives is lacking, as neither work program has systematically explored linkages or possibilities for joint interventions. Collaboration is especially imperative given the fundamental challenges that characterize the promotion of one priority over another. Without coordination across the water, food security, and nutrition communities, actions toward achieving SDG2 on zero hunger may contribute to further degradation of the world’s water resources and as such, further derail achievement of the UN Decade of Action on Water and SDG 6 on water and sanitation. Conversely, actions to enhance SDG 6 may well reduce progress on the UN Decade of Action on Nutrition and SDG 2. This paper reviews these challenges as part of a broader analysis of the complex web of pathways that link water, food security and nutrition outcomes. Climate change and the growing demand for water resources are also considered, given their central role in shaping future water and nutrition security. The main conclusions are presented as three recommendations focused on potential avenues to deal with the complexity of the water-nutrition nexus, and to optimize outcomes, as follows: • Implement nutrition-sensitive agricultural water management. Nutrition and health experts need to join forces with water managers at the farm household level, at the community level and at the government level to strengthen positive transmission pathways between both rainfed and irrigated agriculture, and food and nutrition security. • Increase the environmental sustainability of diets. More work is urgently needed on the impact of current dietary trends on environmental resources, and vice-versa. Not only in terms of documenting harm done under the current status-quo, but also with respect to practical recommendations for regional and national stakeholders on policy reform and investments that counter-act the heavy environmental and health tolls that are being exacted by current diet trends. • Explicitly address social inequities in water-nutrition linkages. Proactively include vulnerable demographics in the development of water services, including incorporating their needs and constraints into initial infrastructure design. The analysis and recommendations in this report are geared toward both United Nations actors and other stakeholders with access to entry points to accelerate progress. Expanding collaboration and evidence generation is particularly important outside the WASH sector where some linkages have already been developed. This will be imperative for reducing trade-offs, and for strengthening momentum.

Published in


Publisher: United Nations System Standing Committee on Nutrition

    UKÄ Subject classification

    Oceanography, Hydrology, Water Resources

    Permanent link to this page (URI)

    https://res.slu.se/id/publ/106771