Thinking Outside the Water Box: Launch of Egypt Flagship Report on Building Policy Coherence of Food, Land, And Water Systems

On October 15^th at the 7^th edition of Cairo Water Week, the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) launched the flagship report on building policy coherence of food, land, and water systems of Egypt under the CGIAR Initiative on National Policies and Strategies (NPS).

"Policy coherence is essential in resource-scarce times, aligning sectors to optimize resources, reduce conflict, and enhance resilience against shocks, ensuring sustainable development." IWMI's regional representative in MENA, Dr. Youssef Brouziyne, said as he opened the event.

Figure 2: Fayrouz Eldabbagh presenting the results of the flagship report. © Abdelrahman Khaled on 15th of October 2024, Cairo Water Week

"Producing more with less" is currently the vision of the Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation (MWRI) when working with other water demand sectors. This flagship report expands on this vision by framing the analysis of policy coherence under enhancing 'climate-adaptive water productivity'. It emphasizes the policy linkages between rationalizing water use with increasing food production, agricultural economic value, and income and job creation in the agrifood systems.

Lessons Learned on Policy Coherence

Whole of Government; Systems approach

Water availability, quality, and access are affected by other policies on climate, biodiversity, agriculture, food, and health. In this regard, the OECD Head of Unit, Water Governance, Blue and Circular Economy, Dr. Oriana Romano, calls to adopt a system approach to water governance. "As a water specialist, we always call to think outside the water box" added Dr. Romano. Therefore, "there is a need to embed water policies into social, political, and physical systems", stressed Dr. Alan Nicol, NPS co-lead and principal researcher at IWMI.

Stakeholder Engagement

Stakeholder engagement and coordination from global to decentral levels are significant in building coherent policy-making between various water users, especially at times of scarcity and drought. Mr. Al-Motaz Abadi shared a four-step multi-stakeholder engagement to create political will within the Mediterranean region. First, it convenes policy dialogues. Second, it translates them into policies and strategies. Third, it creates a proof-of-concept project selected for implementation. Fourth, building partnerships under the WEFE nexus hub.

Monitoring and Evaluation

"We talk to each other, which is good but not enough. We need to talk, implement, invest, monitor, and evaluate together" said UNESCWA economic affairs officer, Dr. Hammou Laamrani. To create these win-win situations of collaboration across sectors, he suggested a monitoring matrix that measures the cost and benefits of coherence and incoherence on trade and economic growth.

Financial Coherence

The benefits behind maximizing synergies and reducing trade-offs need considerable investment. However, these investments need to address the political economy status when 60 to 70% of the low and middle-income countries' public budgets go to debt services and around 10 to 15% go to salaries, thus, very little remains for investment.

Political Opportunity

In some areas, coordination between different sectors occurred because of an external shock, pandemic, economic crisis, or war. "Knowing the right time to build policy coherence is key, we need to consider the political opportunity in place" Dr. Laamrani continued.

The flagship report resonates with insights shared by speakers and panelists. It starts by mapping the power and influence of the agrifood system institutions. It adds to capitalizing on existing horizontal mechanisms between sectoral ministries, especially between agriculture and irrigation. Moreover, it calls on enhancing vertical coherence between the center and grassroots levels by enhancing the decision-making capacities of local and community-based irrigation associations.

At the end, I invite the reader to reflect on a question, raised by Dr. Alan Nicol "If you're a minister today and I ask you to act on policy coherence, what would be your first answer?"

Figure 3: A ranking survey was used to collect insights from the audiences on priorities to improve policy coherence. Results showed three main priorities: cross-sectoral coordination between national institutions, empowerment of local institutions and directorates, and strong monitoring and evaluation tools. Figure 4: A ranking survey was used on the type of investment needed for building policy coherence. Three main priorities: research and development, multi-stakeholder platforms, and capacity building and training.

Acknowledgement:

The authors acknowledge the valuable contributions of:

• Alan Nicol (Co-Lead of NPS and Principal Researcher at IWMI)
• Rabab Gaber (General Director of the Water Resources Department, Planning Sector at the Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation),
• Ahmed Nasr-Allah (Country Director at WorldFish Egypt),
• Oriana Romano Head of Unit, Water Governance, Blue and Circular Economy and chair of Water Governance Initiative at the OECD
• Mustapha Abderrafik, Head of Statistics and Strategies Division at the Ministry of Agriculture, Maritime Fisheries, Rural Development and Water and Forests of Morocco
• Hammou Laamrani, Economic Affairs Officer at UNESCWA
• Almotaz Abadi, Deputy Secretary General, Water, Environment, and Blue Economy, Union for the Mediterranean (UfM)

Authors:

Fayrouz Eldabbagh, National Researcher - Political Scientist, IWMI

Youssef Brouziyne, Country Representative - Egypt. IWMI

Photo credit:

Feature image/photo: Omar Hassan

Session photo: Abdelrahman Khaled

This work is part of the CGIAR Research Initiative on National Policies and Strategies (NPS). CGIAR launched NPS with national and international partners to build policy coherence, respond to policy demands and crises, and integrate policy tools at national and subnational levels in countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. CGIAR centers participating in NPS are The Alliance of Bioversity International and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (Alliance Bioversity-CIAT), International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), International Water Management Institute (IWMI), International Potato Center (CIP), International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), and WorldFish. We would like to thank all funders who supported this research through their contributions to the CGIAR Trust Fund.

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