In September 2015, world leaders committed to work toward achieving seventeen Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as part of their 2030 sustainable development agenda. Each Goal includes a list of quantifiable targets to achieve during the 15-year term. As each nation works toward achieving this agenda, there are risks of potential competition between specific targets, which could cause unintended consequences and additional. These issues become particularly complex when focusing on the three highly interconnected Water, Energy, and Food Goals (2, 6, and 7): the strategy for one directly affects the other two. While it is important that we work toward achieving all 17 Goals, it is equally important that we understand the level of their interconnectedness and the potential competition between them.  The challenges facing water, food, and energy resource systems are tightly interconnected. Quantitative assessment tools can play a major role in providing insights regarding the trade-offs associated with possible future pathways by informing policy and investor decisions. Tools that cover various aspects of the interconnected resource systems exist in the literature and can be used and customized to address specific resource hotspots. This presentation explores the role of such tools within the context of Morocco as a case study. In the face of increasing stresses - rapidly growing populations and cities, climate change, and booming industrial sector, particularly its phosphate industry - Morocco recently announced several national plans for better managing its water, energy, and food systems. This presentation starts by demonstrating the interconnections between SDGs 2, 6, 7 and the role of quantitative tools in assessing the impact of the water targets upon the food and energy targets in Morocco. This is followed by exploring examples of trade-offs for implementing different levels of the proposed water, energy, and food national plans, as well as possible social, policy, technical interventions that carry the potential for reducing existing competition and ensuring more sustainable resource allocation in the three national plans at multiple scales.

Water-energy-food and sustainable development goals: The case study of Morocco

ACS Fall 2021

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