A participatory methodology for characterizing and prescribing water-energy-food nexus based on improved casual loop diagrams

Abstract

As the basis of quantitative research over water-energy-food nexus (WEFN), qualitative analysis is indispensable for depicting the systems and providing effective measures and policies. Preceding qualitative WEFN studies largely neglected the role of local stakeholder participation, which could only reflect fragments of the systems. Causal loop diagrams (CLDs) have been proven to be effective for supporting stakeholder participation in many other areas. Nevertheless, there was a lack of impartial methods that could make CLD analysis tractable without significantly impairing the WEFN systems integrity. To fill such gaps, a novel method based on merging and reduction rules was proposed to reasonably merge and downscale WEFN CLDs built by stakeholders. Based on this improved method, a CLD-based methodology was developed as a prototype for characterizing WEFN systems, prescribing the WEFN problem, exploring its causes and consequences, and identifying effective measures and policies for alleviating conflicts. To validate the applicability of the developed methodology, it was applied to a real case. The results indicated that total water consumption, water allocation among varied sectors, available surface water, and available groundwater, as well as indirect factors such as volume of diverted water and agricultural water consumption, were the keys to alleviate water scarcity problem under WEFN in the study area. Measures and polices focusing on the interactions between surface water and groundwater could be viable for alleviating the problem. Directions to enhance tradeoffs and synergies within WEFN systems were also obtained.