Water and Climate: Building Resilient Communities

Lead Guest Editor This special issue of World Water Policy is based on selected papers presented at Cairo Water Week 2024. The Cairo Water Week 2024 theme, “Water and Climate: Building Resilient Communities,” highlights the crucial role of integrated water management in addressing the escalating impacts of climate change. Communities globally confront risks caused by extreme events of flood, drought, heatwaves, and other weather events that challenge their livelihood. They develop their own approaches to cope and adapt to such unpredictable changes, and by doing so, they build their own community resilience. The IPCC Sixth Assessment Report defines climate resilience as “the capacity of social, economic and ecosystems to cope with a hazardous event or trend or disturbance.” It includes the abilities to reorganize and learn (IPCC 2022). To increase climate resilience, one must reduce the climate vulnerability of people, communities, and countries. Climate change vulnerability describes how strongly people or ecosystems are likely to be affected by climate change. Different regions face different risks and cope; accordingly, for example, coastal regions might prioritize sea-level rise defenses and mangrove restoration, while arid areas would focus on water scarcity solutions, land restoration, and heat management. Resilience is associated with the cause and its severity level. For example, resilience toward flood is different from resilience toward drought. Also, the resilience level depends on the severity of the event, for example, flood (average or tsunami) or drought (mild or severe). Climate resilience also refers to the ability to anticipate, prepare for, and respond to hazardous events, trends, or disturbances related to climate. Improving climate resilience involves assessing how climate change will alter current climate-related risks and taking steps to better cope with these risks. The five pillars of climate resilience are threshold capacity, coping capacity, recovery capacity, adaptive capacity, and transformative capacity. Seven integral and interrelated components make a community resilient: competence, confidence, connection, character, contribution, coping, and control. There are five main ways countries can adapt to the climate crisis: early warning systems, ecosystem restoration, climate-resilient infrastructure, water supplies and security, and long-term planning. The process of building climate resilience includes four stages: be aware and educated, anticipate, prepare and adapt, and sustain resilience. Climate resilience and adaptation are often discussed together; however, “adaptation” is an action or a set of actions that reduce physical climate risk while “resilience” describes a state of readiness to face climate risks. Resilience requires the integration of water resource management, infrastructure development, active community engagement, and effective strategies that involve not only the construction of resilient water systems but also the implementation of eco-friendly practices and nature-based solutions. Additionally, the establishment of early warning systems becomes paramount to enhance community preparedness for the unpredictable climatic changes. These measures contribute to the creation of resilient communities capable of avoiding the severe impact posed by the extreme climatic events. Climate change affects water resources availability. More rain could lead to flood and recharge of the groundwater while less rain could lead to drought and decline in river flows and groundwater recharge. Land use also affects the water resources, for example, changing grassland to broad leaves trees would reduce the recharge and runoff to streams. Examples from studies in the United Kingdom are given by Afzal and Ragab (2019, 2020a, 2020b, 2020c) and Afzal et al. (2021), in Brazil by Montenegro and Ragab (2010) and Montenegro and Ragab (2012), in Italy by D'Agostino et al. (2010), in Algeria by Yamina and Ragab (2019) and Yamina et al. (2016), in the Mediterranean region by Ragab and Prudhomme (2002), and in India by Garg et al. (2020), Nune et al. (2021), and Wable et al. (2022). Coping with water scarcity has been investigated by Hamdy et al. (2003) and by Ragab and Depre (2023). Several studies indicated that the gap between water supply and water demand is getting wider with time and is expected to be wider under the predicted climate change scenarios. The future gap between water supply and demand was investigated for Cyprus by Ragab et al. (2010) and for Italy by D'Agostino et al. (2010). The climate change impact on crop growth, length of growing season, and irrigation requirements was reported for Morocco by Hirich et al. (2016), for Italy by Pulvento et al. (2015), for Pakistan by Chauhdary et al. (2024, 2025), and for Egypt by Marwa et al. (2020) and Mehanna et al. (2024). In the past decade, the interrelationships among water, energy, and food—the “W–E–F Nexus” —were recognized as a better way to look comprehensively at the integrated management of these three elements in connection with climate change and ecosystems. Food production requires irrigation, and irrigation requires both water and energy. Integrated management of natural resources within the Nexus framework is the way forward (Ragab 2024a, 2023, 2022; Jelle et al. 2021). To investigate the future climate change impact, climate change scenarios were developed at climate research centers. In addition, hydrological models have been developed to run those scenarios and assess the impact on water resources at the catchment scale, for example, the IHMS model (Ragab and Bromley 2010; Ragab et al. 2010). Models for field scale were also developed to assess the impact of future climate change on crop yield, season's length, and irrigation requirement, for example, the SALTMED model (Ragab 2015, 2020). However, models do have uncertainty in their results (Ragab et al. 2020), which was discussed in a recent paper on misunderstandings and misconceptions in managing water resources (Ragab 2024b). Cairo Water Week is becoming a well-known platform where experts, policymakers, and stakeholders converge to share and deliberate on innovative solutions and collaborative initiatives. Through panel discussions and workshops, the knowledge shared during the week-long event, a list of actions, recommendations, and the conference declaration are considered for future actions to advance our knowledge and form the basis for future strategic plans by the authorities in different countries. Transboundary Water Governance for Sustainable Development Strategic Water Resources Management in Enhancing Community Resilience Innovation and Financing Resilient Solutions for Water Security Actions for Water and Climate Adaptations and Resilience Climate-Smart Communities Planning and Legislation Papers Selected for This Special Issue Two papers were selected: Enhancing Water Stress Tolerance in Wheat and Advanced Phenotyping Methods for Improved Genotype Selection in Arid Regions and Unconventional Coastal Structures (Kemit Armor Layer). In a paper by Ali Karnib, Naglaa Elbendary, Waleed Abouelhassan, and Mohamed Dawoud entitled Energy–Food–Ecosystem Nexus Perspective, the authors investigated the adoption of solar-powered drip irrigation systems in Egypt's sugarcane agriculture, analyzing the potential for improved sustainability through the water–energy–food–ecosystem (WEFE) nexus. Located in Qena Governorate, the research utilizes the Q-Nexus model to compare traditional diesel-powered irrigation with solar-powered drip irrigation, focusing on their impacts on resource efficiency, agricultural productivity, and environmental services. The results demonstrate significant benefits of solar-powered drip irrigation, including a 48% reduction in water usage and a 93% decrease in diesel fuel consumption compared to baseline values. Additionally, this approach resulted in a 34% reduction in labor and a 55% decrease in fertilizer use, while increasing sugarcane yield by 16%. Environmentally, the shift to solar-powered systems drastically lowered greenhouse gas emissions and reduced toxicity from fertilizer runoff, underscoring the potential for enhancing agricultural sustainability and efficiency. This study highlighted the necessity for reforms and investment in infrastructure and the government's role in providing subsidies, incentives, and technical training to encourage the widespread adoption of efficient and sustainable technologies like solar-powered drip irrigation. The second paper, A Policy Framework to Mainstream the Water–Food–Energy–Environment Nexus Into Water Resources Management, is by Inas EL-Gafy, Sherif Mohamady, Neil Grigg, and Islam Sabry Al Zayed. This study presented a structured policy framework that effectively mainstreams the water–food–energy–environment nexus (WEFEN) approach into water resources management. The WEFEN framework highlights the intricate interconnections between water, food, energy, and environmental sectors, offering a comprehensive strategy to optimize resource use at both macro (national and regional) and micro (farm) levels. This paper explained the development of the framework for policy development to enable the needed mainstreaming. The concept adopted four principles to balance social, economic, and environmental dimensions: the optimal use of resources, environment preservation, community development, and mitigation and adaptation of climate change. Implementing the WEFEN framework would result in significant benefits, including improved agricultural productivity, water and energy efficiency, and enhanced environmental conservation. Furthermore, it could contribute to achieving key sustainable development goals (SDGs), particularly those related to water security, food security, and climate mitigation. To ensure the successful implementation of the WEFEN framework, it requires institutional reform and capacity building, stakeholder engagement and collaboration, incentives for sustainable practices, and monitoring and evaluation mechanisms. By adopting these recommendations, the integration of the WEFEN framework into water resources management can be accelerated, helping countries like Egypt achieve more sustainable and efficient resource use while securing food, water, and energy for future generations. In a third paper, Modernization of Irrigation Systems: The Experience of the Collective Conversion to Drip Irrigation in Morocco (analysis and lessons learned), Belabhir Afaf and Sedki Azeddine analyzed the new experience of the project of the collective conversion to drip irrigation in the Ouled Said Taourirt Skhirat area, which is financed by the European Bank of Investment (EBI). The conversion included 5453 ha and 2700 farmers. The implementation cost of this project was $37 million, which covered the network equipment installation. The farmer's network equipment was guaranteed within the framework of the Agricultural Development Fund (ADF). The paper indicated that the incentive system only is not enough to bring about the necessary genuine irrigation transition in Morocco and the public institutions should move toward a combination of incentive system for the drip irrigation with more pressure on the current use of surface irrigation; the latter can be dealt with by changes in irrigation water pricing and more stringent rules regarding the use of surface irrigation especially in water-scarce regions of the kingdom and/or where water resources (both surface and underground) are depleted. For the success of these projects, the government should continue to support the beneficiary farmers with new technologies to save water and organize training sessions and workshops. The first paper in this group focused on the impact of downstream dams on upstream countries. The paper, entitled Predicted Effect of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam on the Epilimnion Temperature in the High Aswan Dam Reservoir, is by Mai Wagih Alsadeq, Yasmin Nassar, and Ahmed Wagdy Abd Eldayem. This study investigated some of the environmental impacts of the operation of the GERD on the High Aswan Dam (HAD) reservoir. This paper indicated that the water-level fluctuations due to the operation of the GERD will directly affect the thermodynamics of the HAD reservoir. This study also indicated that the water level in the HAD reservoir will decline by 10–27 m, due to filling of the reservoir upstream of the GERD over the next few years. In addition, the results showed that the average epilimnion temperature of the northern region of the HAD reservoir is expected to increase during summer from 31°C pre–GERD operation to the average epilimnion temperature of the region is expected to increase during summer from pre–GERD operation to In the epilimnion in the region is expected to be the northern This is due to the of the on these some policy are such as adaptive water management strategies to the impacts of water on the This study that to these impacts and ensure the sustainable management of water resources in the it is to comprehensive and The second paper, entitled of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam on in the High Aswan Dam Reservoir, is by Mai Alsadeq, Yasmin Nassar, and Ahmed Wagdy Abd Eldayem. 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