Bringing WASH into the Water–Energy–Food Nexus in Humanitarian Settings

Abstract

This paper examines the water–energy–food (WEF) nexus in a humanitarian context, with a specific focus on water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH). It highlights the complex and non-linear interactions that WASH has with other areas of the WEF nexus. In doing so, it blends the social dimensions (access, safety, consumption, and use) with the WEF resource dimensions (availability and resource sustainability), including a further emphasis on sanitation as a key, but often ignored, element of the WEF nexus. Drawing on the case of the Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh, we examine how household-level access to WASH shapes and is shaped by use, access, and availability of energy and food, and finally their effects on host–refugee interactions. We find that there are implicit and explicit links between WASH and WEF. Moreover, any small intervention in any of the WEF areas has positive knock-on effects on the other resources, especially in enhancing resource access and use. We conclude that bottom-up perspectives on these interlinkages with active participation from both host and refugee households are required to understand the implicit and explicit connections across WASH and the WEF nexus in humanitarian contexts. We also argue that sanitation is a key element of the WEF nexus and should not be ignored within the predominant resource-centric framing of the WEF.