P-FUTURES: towards urban food & water security through collaborative design and impact

Abstract

Phosphorus is essential to food production, but current management practices fail to ensure equitable access to farmers globally and often results in polluted waterways. There is a lack of local and global governance mechanisims to ensure phosphorus is sustainably managed. The P-FUTURES research initiative aims to address this gap by working with stakeholders to explore visions and pathways of social transformation toward food and water security. In the seed phase of the project, academic, civil, industry, and municipal stakeholders interacted as partners in Blantyre (Malawi), Hanoi (Vietnam), Sydney (Australia), and Phoenix (USA) to collaboratively develop a full proposal and build capacity for transformational change. The article offers guidance on the opportunities and challenges of co-developing a research approach and proposal in a transdisciplinary, international setting. The Phosphorus Challenge Human consumption of phosphorus for food production and industrial uses has increased over fivefold since the 1960's [1], making human activities the driving force of phosphorus flows on the planet [2-6]. Sustainable phosphorus management has been recently emphasized as an essential component to meet UN global food security and water quality objectives [7]. Without access to phosphorus, farmers and nations will not be able to produce sufficient food, yet there are no effective governance mechanisms in place to ensure long-term access to the resource or to stimulate sustainable phosphorus

Transforming phosphorus use on the island of Ireland: A model for a sustainable system

“…While stakeholder workshops assessing phosphorus vulnerability, adaptive capacity and transition pathways at the national level (e.g. and city-scale (Cordell et al, 2016;Iwaniec et al, 2016) have also been undertaken in recent years, these are not directly comparable with the island of Ireland and North American models due to methodological differences. However, our study does augment the existing body of literature pertaining to stakeholder participatory approach based studies conducted on the island of Ireland, for example the development of agri-environmental mitigation strategies for the management of phosphorus to protect water quality (e.g.…”

Remediation of Eutrophic Aquatic Ecosystems: Evaluation of Phosphorus Adsorption by Sawdust

“…The study of new recovery methods for P present in sewage sludge and eutrophic water bodies with subsequent agricultural application is important to simultaneously promote water and food security (Baker 2011;Desmidt et al 2015;Iwaniec et al 2016;Neset et al 2016;Pantano et al 2016;Chowdhury et al 2017;Jacobs et al 2017;Roy 2017;Raymond et al 2018).…”

Governance, polycentricity and the global nitrogen and phosphorus cycles

“…The international community has been struggling to identify an effective governance model for systemic perturbations of global biophysical systems. The global cycles of nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P), two nutrient elements essential for sustaining life, are becoming issues of concern in light of scientific understanding of anthropogenic changes (Table 1), but only a few studies have focused on the governance challenge of nutrient elements (e.g., Galloway et al, 2008, Sutton et al, 2011, Ebbesson, 2014, Scholz et al, 2014, Schroeder, 2014, Iwaniec et al, 2016. These studies call for stronger governance of these nutrient element flows at the international level.…”