This week, Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week is unfolding under the theme, "The Nexus of Next, All Systems Go." It lands with honesty. In our region, the future rarely arrives as a single headline. It arrives as intertwined pressures. A shipping lane tightens, and food prices twitch. A heatwave settles in, and the grid strains. A conflict flares on a coastline, insurance tables shift in London, and the ripple reaches our ports.
Last Saturday, I gave a lecture on the water-energy-food nexus, with a library as the backdrop; adorned with rows of books and illuminated by golden light, it evoked a sense of minds bending forward and proof that a society believes in the long arc. It is a room designed for patience, complexity, and disagreement without breaking the table. We need more rooms like that across the region, because challenges surrounding us demand more than announcements. They demand conversation with continuity and courage to name dependencies before they become emergencies. The nexus is where daily life becomes geopolitical.
Gulf water is engineered. Desalinate, pump, store. That water needs consistent energy, which requires infrastructure that can withstand the summertime surge and the unexpected. Most of the food we eat comes from somewhere else; it travels through corridors, passing through oceans and straits on its way to us. When the Strait of Hormuz feels more constrained, when regional and global discourse sharpens, and when dynamics in the Horn of Africa shift, the ripple reaches us quickly. What can look like separate headlines is often one interconnected story, seen from different angles.
While interdependence puts us at risk, it also has the potential to shield us from harm if planned carefully. Cooperation is transformed from a virtue into a practical option when a system is designed such that its disruption impacts everyone. Moods and speeches are transient, but shared infrastructure endures. Even when tensions are high, shared standards can endure. If all six capitals have the same operational picture, they won't have to worry about finding the same threat at the last minute. For that reason, "All Systems Go” ought to prompt us to ponder more precisely: which systems are involved, and are they able to communicate with one another? Answering that starts with building the foundations for effective coordination.
Visibility comes first. A region cannot coordinate what it cannot see. We need a shared read of water buffers, grid stress, and food exposure that is timely enough to be useful, and trusted enough to be acted on. Data rarely looks glamorous. It is the difference between foresight and surprise. Credibility follows. External markets now ask for proof. Carbon accounting, product-level disclosures and verification are shaping access today. When every country measures differently, the buyer does not see sophistication. They see friction. Consistency becomes a strategic asset, the kind that cannot be built in a rush. Leverage comes last, but it builds on the rest. The Gulf is more than a buyer of food and a seller of energy. It is a builder of systems. Imagine what it means to offer a partner a package: clean power, efficient desalination expertise, and logistics that keep food moving even when the sea grows uncertain — echoing the very corridors we rely on daily. That kind of offer changes negotiations. It turns vulnerability into agency.
Strategy is culture, and you can feel it in a library. It is the habit of thinking beyond the week, the patience to sit with complexity until a better design appears. The nexus is the web that holds our lives together. All systems go, but are they going together?
The writer is an Omani environmental strategist advancing Middle East climate action and women’s leadership. Follow her on LinkedIn: @RumaithaAlBusaidi
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