Water for Food Security, Nutrition and Social Justice

Water is fundamental to human food security and nutrition (FSN). It is essential to all types of food production, preparation and processing. Safe drinking water and sanitation are fundamental to the nutrition, health and dignity of all. Yet in most parts of the world, water is under increasing stress, with rising competing demand from other sectors and increasing pollution undermining its contribution to FSN. This book explores the relationships and linkages between water and FSN across multiple scales.

This book is the first comprehensive effort to bring together Water and FSN in a way that goes beyond the usual focus on agricultural production by also examining crucial aspects concerning water and sanitation for human wellbeing and for maintaining ecosystem integrity. The authors challenge mainstream supply-oriented and neo-Malthusian visions that argue for the need to increase the amount of land under irrigation and farming productivity in order to feed the growing world’s population. Instead, it argues for the need to reframe the debate to look at issues concerning consumption, waste, dietary patterns and production processes whilst proposing alternative strategies to improve water and land productivity, putting the interests of marginalised and disenfranchised groups upfront.

Focusing on the technical, institutional, socio-economic, cultural and political dimensions, this book is a comprehensive and holistic assessment of water for FSN. It proposes a paradigm change in the way water is managed in agriculture as well as addressing the complex knowledge and governance challenges at scale. It is original in making a case for strengthening the relationship between the right to water and the right to food and will be of great interest to practioners, students and researchers working on water and food issues.

Lyla Mehta is Professorial fellow at the Institute of Development Studies, UK and Visiting Professor at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences.

Theib Oweis is a Distinguished Guest Professor of water management at Tottori University, Japan.

Claudia Ringler leads the water and natural resource management themes at the International Food Policy Reasearch Institute with 20 years‘ experience in different capacities

Barbara Schreiner is?Executive Director of the Pegasys Institute, Pretoria. Barbara is a water resources expert with a particular focus on poverty and gender, with over 20 years experience in the public, private and NGO sectors.

Shiney Varghese is a?policy analyst and researcher on the right to water, the right to food, and agroecology with the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy.

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