The impact of the Ukraine war on the water, energy and food nexus in the Mediterranean region: challenges and potential responses

Over the last decade and a half, the Mediterranean region has been affected by several destabilizing events, including the financial crisis; the 2007-08 and 2010-11 food crises; the «Arab Spring» popular uprisings, influenced by soaring food prices; the civil war in Syria; the migration emergency; and, more recently, the COVID-19 pandemic. Moreover, the current global crisis triggered by Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 poses additional critical challenges for the region. The interaction between these present and future risks results in a comprehensive «polycrisis», a cluster of related global risks with compounding effects, such that the overall impact exceeds the sum of each part. This chapter highlights the effects of the Ukraine war on the Water, Energy, and Food (WEF) resources in the Mediterranean region, considering both the sectoral and the nexus levels. Starting from presenting the WEF nexus concept and exploring the impact of the Russia-Ukraine war on the WEF resources, our study aims to detect the barriers and the opportunities to turn the WEF nexus from a vicious circle of trade-offs into a virtuous circle of synergies that feed each other. To overcome this challenge, several actions are identified and specific recommendations are made for the way forward.