A quantitative understanding of the state and determinants of water-energy-food security in Africa

To date, there are limited quantitative inter-comparisons and assessments of water-energy-food (WEF) resources availability in Africa, while existing studies do not reveal disparities in WEF security among different sub-regions thus failing to offer lessons for coordinated efforts. This study provides a quantitative evaluation of WEF resources across Africa. In so doing, it develops a composite indicator to assess the state of WEF security and explores the socioeconomic determinants of WEF security in Africa. Results show that, Africa is endowed with enormous resources, however, there are substantial disparities among countries and sub-regions. The water-energy-food security index (WEFSI) scores show that eight countries (15 %) obtained high WEFSI scores (>0.61), 31 countries (57 %) obtained moderate scores in the range 0.41 – 0.60 while the other countries (28 %) obtained low scores (<0.40). Several countries are not on track to achieving water-energy-food security in the short to medium term. We also found that GDP per capita, government effectiveness, foreign direct investment and official development assistance correlate strongly with WEF security. Overall, our findings suggest that whilst WEF resources availability is essential, they do not guarantee WEF security; having the socioeconomic capacity to harness these resources is critical for achieving WEF security. Thus, prospects for achieving SDGs remain slender but centrally lie in national efforts at re-reorganising governance and economic efforts and how these relate to wider investments. We call for urgent steps to ensure targeted socioeconomic development within and across many countries, to enhance WEF security in Africa.