FEW: River FEWs: Workshop to explore the nexus between food, energy and water in a large international river system ; University of Washington; September, 2015

该项目将召开为期三天的研讨会，探讨大型河流生态系统中食物、能源和水（FEW）系统之间的自然和社会科学联系。本次研讨会将汇集30-50名在FEWS联系的一个或多个要素方面具有科学和/或政策专业知识的人员，其目标是确定生态可持续性背景下的关键驱动因素和联系、紧急特性和关键研究需求。与会者将重点关注湄公河流域作为一个典型的少数民族耦合社会生态系统。生活在湄公河流域的6000多万人高度依赖这条河获得食物和生计。野生捕捞的鱼和大米是主要的营养来源，渔业和水稻农业的生产力都取决于自然洪水脉冲水文制度。干流和支流水电开发、土地利用的快速变化和气候变化，都可能对黄河的洪水脉冲产生巨大影响。预计新能源的经济效益将是巨大的，但目前人们对其社会和环境影响知之甚少。因此，渔业/农业、水文动力学和水电构成了湄公河的食物、水和能源三难困境，并在空间和时间上相互联系。本次研讨会的成果将为理解湄公河和其他河流生态系统中FEW动态相互联系和相互依存的本质奠定基础。该项目将通过提高湄公河科学家和未被充分代表的群体的科学能力来支持教育和多样性。大型河流生态系统为人们提供了大量动态的生态系统产品和服务。尽管人们对河流产生的商品和服务的类型有了大致的了解，并广泛认识到河流的社会和经济效益，但在评估创造生态系统服务和生计的物理、生物和社会动态方面，明显缺乏概念性和定量框架。因此，了解生态系统变化的影响和评估权衡的能力有限。本次研讨会将通过以下方式开始解决这些限制：1)建立一个概念模型，说明大型河流中多种物理、社会和生态过程如何连接和构建FEW系统；2)在此框架内确定维持可持续性的关键联系和流动；3)评价现有数据和量化这些过程的能力；4)确定解决研究概念和数据差距的关键未来研究需求。主要研究人员已经确定了最初的60个潜在受邀者，其中包括活跃在湄公河地区的一系列机构的国际代表。这些机构包括学术、政府（美国和湄公河）、政府间和非政府组织。调查人员打算邀请50-70名预计30-35岁的参与者参加，其中女性和代表性不足的少数民族的参与率超过40%。具体产品将包括白皮书和期刊文章，描述河流中食物水能源研究的现状和前沿，以及数字存档。发展新的合作关系来解决关键的研究问题是研讨会的一个具体目标，并受到强烈期待。更广泛的影响将包括湄公河科学家和来自政府和非政府机构的政策利益相关者直接参与研讨会的各个方面，以确保成果符合利益相关者的需求，并可用于决策过程。研讨会的所有产品将通过项目网站、华盛顿大学的湄公河门户网站mekong.uw.edu以及佛罗里达州立大学的湄公河门户网站coss.fsu.edu/mekong免费提供。这项研究将通过湄公河科学家参与研讨会的规划、执行和发表研讨会成果，为提高该地区的科学能力作出贡献。

This project will convene a three-day workshop to explore natural and social science linkages between food, energy, and water (FEW) systems in large river ecosystems. This workshop will bring together 30-50 persons with scientific and/or policy expertise within one or more elements of the FEWS nexus with the goal of identifying key drivers and linkages, emergent properties, and critical research needs within the context of ecological sustainability. The participants will focus on the Mekong River Basin as an archetypal FEW coupled social-ecological system. More than 60 million people living in the Mekong are highly dependent on the river for food and livelihoods. Wild-caught fish and rice are the primary sources of nutrition, with the productivity of both fisheries and rice agriculture dependent on the natural flood-pulse hydrologic regime. The river is facing potentially large changes to the flood-pulse from mainstream and tributary hydropower development, rapid land use change and climate change. The economic benefits of new energy are expected to be substantial, but the social and environmental impacts are at present poorly understood. Fisheries/agriculture, hydrologic dynamics, and hydropower therefore form the food, water, and energy trilemma in the Mekong and are linked in both space and time. The results of this workshop will create a foundation for understanding the interconnected and interdependent nature of FEW dynamics in the Mekong and other river ecosystems. The project will support both education and diversity by enhancing the scientific capacity of Mekong scientists and underrepresented groups.Large river ecosystems provide numerous and dynamic ecosystem goods and services to people. Despite a general understanding of the types of goods and services derived from rivers and a widespread recognition of their social and economic benefit, there is a distinct lack of conceptual and quantitative frameworks for evaluating the physical, biological, and social dynamics that create ecosystem services and livelihoods. As such, there is limited ability to understand impacts from ecosystem change and to evaluate tradeoffs. This workshop will begin to address these limitations by: 1) developing a conceptual model of how multiple physical, social, and ecological processes connect and structure FEW systems in large rivers; 2) within this framework identify key linkages and flows for maintaining sustainability; 3) evaluate currently available data and capacity for quantifying these processes; and 4) identify key future research needs for addressing research conceptual and data gaps. The principal investigators have identified an initial set of 60 potential invitees, including international representation from a range of institutions active in the Mekong region. These include academic, governmental (US and Mekong), intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations. The investigators intend to invite 50-70 participants expecting 30-35 to attend with greater than 40% participation by women and underrepresented minorities. Specific products will include a white paper and journal article describing the current status and frontier of Food Water Energy research in rivers, as well as digital archiving. Development of new collaborations to address critical research questions is a specific goal of the workshop and is strongly anticipated. The broader impacts will include direct engagement of Mekong scientists and policy stakeholders from governmental and non-governmental institutions in all aspect of the workshop to ensure that outcomes are relevant to stakeholder needs and available for uptake in the decision making process. All products from the workshop will be made feely available via the project website, the Mekong portal at the University of Washington, mekong.uw.edu, and through the Florida State University Mekong portal at coss.fsu.edu/mekong. This research will contribute to improved scientific capacity in the region through participation of Mekong scientists in the workshop planning, execution, and publication of workshop outputs.