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Mohtar and ONE-NEXUS Team Awarded First PRIMA WEFE Nexus Award

By: Mary Schweitzer - October 19, 2021
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Rabi Mohtar
Dr. Rabi Mohtar

Rabi Mohtar, Professor of Biological & Agricultural Engineering and Civil & Environmental Engineering at Texas A&M University, together with his international team of researchers, developed the proposal “ONE-NEXUS” selected as one of two recipients of the first annual Partnership for Research and Innovation in the Mediterranean Area (PRIMA) Water, Energy, Food and Ecosystems (WEFE) Nexus Award.

The PRIMA WEFE Nexus Award recognizes and celebrates outstanding teams of researchers and practitioners who have used their results to demonstrate the wider socio-economic benefits of the proposed practices through a WEFE Nexus approach in the Mediterranean region and highlights the successful implementation of combined management practices of water, energy, food, and ecosystem resources in the Mediterranean at local, sub-regional and or regional levels.

Mohtar’s ONE-NEXUS proposal won the PRIMA Prize in recognition of his journey of contributions to research in WEFE Nexus that began in Qatar, with the development of the WEF Nexus Tool 2.0 to address Qatar’s national food self-sufficiency policy, continued through a 3-year inter-disciplinary investigation into resource challenges facing the San Antonio Region and establishment of Texas a7m University’s Water-Energy-Food Nexus Initiative (WEFNI). The journey includes Lebanon, where, in partnership with the UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), a WEF Nexus framework and tool were developed to access tradeoffs in water and energy in agriculture and interlinkages with social, political, and economic aspects. Multiple iterations of the original WEF Nexus Tool 2.0 were adapted and scaled to address regional challenges as demonstrated from studies in Texas, Morocco, Turkey, and Lebanon. The tool became a part of the UNDG ‘SDG Acceleration Tool Kit’. Lessons learned and transferable outcomes were disseminated in a STOTEN special issue that informed initiatives in other regions. 

The prize was delivered by Mr. John Bell, Director DG Research and Innovation of the European Commission, at the 2021 WEFE Nexus Science Advances Conference, co-organized by the European Commission, Union for the Mediterranean, PRIMA, and the Cyprus Institute, 

Mohtar and his team received the award during an online ceremony in September 2021. 

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