Miles from any shoreline, fishing trawlers lie stranded on a sun-scorched lakebed in Uzbekistan’s ship graveyard at Moynaq. These vessels, once vital to a thriving fishing industry, now rest on what was the Aral Sea floor – a stark reminder of ecological collapse. In the 1960s, when Soviet engineers diverted the Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers to irrigate vast cotton fields in Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, they set in motion a catastrophe that would shrink the world’s fourth-largest lake by over 90%. Local fishing communities collapsed as salinity increased, and species disappeared. The exposed seabed released dust storms carrying salts and contaminants across the region, leading to respiratory problems and other health issues among local populations.
The bitter irony of this story is that the water diversion that destroyed the Aral Sea failed to sustain agriculture as promised. Yields dropped as soil became waterlogged and salinized. This cautionary tale stands as a sobering reminder – unregulated water abstraction, without consideration of the ecological context, doesn’t just dry up rivers and lakes, it undermines health, livelihoods and the delicate balance that sustains life itself.
Water and fisheries don’t just have a relationship to agriculture, they are fundamental to its success. In a recent paper the International Water Management Institute’s Mark Smith, director general, and Matthew McCartney, research group leader of the Sustainable Water Infrastructure and Ecosystems research group, in collaboration with scientists from other international research organizations and UK universities, comment on the importance of better considering water in agroecology, and urge the global community to better integrate water and aquatic foods in efforts to make food systems more sustainable and equitable.
A gap in a holistic approach
Agroecology has rightfully gained recognition as a holistic approach to food system sustainability. Unlike conventional agricultural approaches that rely on crop monocultures, isolated livestock production, and environmentally disruptive chemical inputs, agroecology promotes farming in harmony with nature. It also focuses on equitable value chains and governance across food systems.
Academic interest in agroecology has surged dramatically, with publications growing from just three papers in 1990 to nearly 250 in 2021. But our research reveals that even with this amassed interest in agroecology, water resources and aquatic foods remain largely absent in published literature and monitoring frameworks, which partly explains why these topics are excluded from high-level discourse and agroecological investments. Effectively there is a gap in the holistic approach.
Water serves as the crucial connector in agroecological systems, binding agricultural practices to broader ecosystems. Water connects people and ecosystems across landscapes. The actions of farmers, even those located a long way from a river, when combined with the activities of all other farmers, can profoundly impact freshwater ecosystems.
Water’s importance extends beyond farm productivity; aquatic foods, derived from fish and other aquatic organisms, form a critical part of many people’s diets worldwide. Unfortunately, the authors find that fishers, foragers, and pastoralists are often forgotten or ignored, preventing them from playing an essential role in creating more sustainable agricultural systems. This separation of water and aquatic food systems from agricultural thinking undermines our ability to develop truly sustainable food production.
Minding the gap
The authors emphasize that water and fisheries are not peripheral to agricultural systems but fundamentally integral to them. Their recommendations center on recognizing that healthy agricultural ecosystems cannot exist without proper water management and vibrant aquatic food systems. The strategic actions they propose aim to reintegrate these conventionally separated domains, creating agricultural approaches that acknowledge the vital interdependence among land cultivation, water resources, and aquatic food production for truly sustainable food systems.
The researchers call for explicit recognition of the role of water and aquatic foods in agroecological principles and practice. They observed that the 13 agroecological principles proposed by the UN High Level Panel of Experts (HLPE) on Food Security and Nutrition — which have significantly shaped the discourse and action on food systems transformation since the 2021 UN Food Systems Summit — make little to no reference to water or aquatic foods. This omission is also common in much of the broader agroecological literature; not just journal papers but also frameworks assessing agroecological performance.
To address this gap, the researchers proposed a revision of six of the 13 HLPE agroecological principles, explicitly to include water, aquatic foods, and aquatic and marine environments. These revisions were refined through a consultation process involving other researchers and practitioners, facilitated by the Transformative Partnership Platform on Agroecology, along with input from two anonymous reviewers.
For example, they expanded Principle 6 from simply “Soil Health” to “Soil Health and Water Resources,” with additions to the statement: “secure and enhance soil health and water resources to ensure (1) functioning for improved plant and aquatic animal growth, particularly by managing organic matter and enhancing soil and substrate biological activity; and (2) adequate quantity and quality of water for both in situ food production and downstream biodiversity and ecosystem services.”
They also suggest broadening the definition of food producers to include fishers, foragers, pastoralists, and others beyond traditional farmers. For instance, their revised principle on co-creation of knowledge would now cover to “enhance co-creation and horizontal sharing of knowledge including local and scientific innovation especially through farmer-to-farmer and other food producers exchange.”
While holistic and inclusive approaches to agroecology already exist, the paper’s recommendations and the proposed revisions to the 13 agroecological principles offer a promising step towards a more comprehensive and integrated approach. This work could help shape future agroecological practice, investment, strategy, planning, implementation and evaluation.
