Sustainable Development Strategies in Asian Countries: The Water-Energy-Food Security Nexus
Authors:   Asia-Europe Perspective Association, KIM Gene Uhc 
Published: December 2024

In a world undergoing dangerous climate change and other serious environmental ills, there is widespread understanding that worldwide environmental objectives need a higher profile. The member countries of the UN General Assembly in 2015 adopted the ‘Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development’. At its heart are the 5 categories(people, planet, prosperity, peace, partnership), the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the associated 169 targets(outcome targets and means of implementation targets) and 232 indicators. This paper proposes sustainable development strategies considering the status of three sectors’ Goals (Water-Energy-Food) in Asian developing countries.
The sustainable development strategy will be obtained from the Evaluation Index(EI). The establishment of the Evaluation Index can be characterized in three stages. The first stage is selection of the indicators of Water sector (SDG-6), Energy sector(SDG-7) and Food sector(SDG-2) separately. The lists of targets and indicators for each of the 17 SDGs was published in a UN resolution in 2017. Considering the availability of data in Asian countries, the indicators have been selected. The second is characterized as formula for standardize all indicators. In this analysis, the old HDI method(before 2010) has been adopted to transform a raw variable(value) into a unit-free index between 0 and 1. The third stage will be the choice of weight for each indicator. Even though optimal weights would be obtained from the users’ survey as well as experts’ survey, arithmetic mean will be used in the analysis due to lack of survey data.
This analysis considers recent status(values) of water-energy-food sectors in Asian developing countries (including ASEAN) applying the indicators presented by international organizations including the UN. Water-EI, Energy-EI, Food-EI can be obtained separately by the formula which adopted the old HDI method from the indicators’ values of all countries. The Nexus-EI is calculated from the Water-EI, Energy-EI, Food-EI using the arithmetic mean and it determines the ranking of countries.
According to the Nexus-EI, the least advantaged country has been Lao PDR whose best development strategies should be water efficiency in Water sector and crop production and food supply variability in food sector. Mongolia, second worst country in Asia, should adopt the sustainable development strategies for increase the renewable energy consumption in energy sector, improve undernourishment and reduce food supply variability in food sector. Myanmar needs to adopt strategies to improve three sectors simultaneously, especially development strategies for higher water efficiency(water sector), higher electricity accessibility(energy sector), lower prevalence of anemia(food sector). Cambodia should focus on its water resources strategy(extended basic water drinking services, lower defecation). Pakistan government determines investment plan for higher water efficiency, easier access to electricity, lower prevalence of anemia simultaneously. Nepal’s best strategy would be water sector investment for improve the water efficiency and for protect and restore water-related ecosystems. In energy sector, China should increase percentage of renewable energy and Butane should invest the energy intensity level of primary energy.
Even though all indicators could not be analysed in this paper, sustainable development policies of several countries are proposed using the 11 indicators. For the calculation of the Water-EI, Energy-EI, Food-EI and Nexus-EI, the optimal weights obtained from the survey of users and experts should be employed instead of simple weights(arithmetic mean) using in this paper.